#booker's just booker but still very good i love how pink they both are

[wizkiddx]

unusable faces

i have exams hence why i needed to write something exceptionally cringe :)

PSA: this is completely inspired from one of my fave writers own blurb @blissfulparker​ --> completely recommend u go read hers its much better than anything i could ever write!!!! (and just her whole account) = link

Summary: pure exhaustion and mutual pining, Tom Holland x actress!reader

^(just thought this was cute, doesn't really fit aha but full credit to op!!)

A scheduling nightmare would be putting it lightly. Perhaps almost unavoidable but that didn’t make it any less of a hellish form a torture. Harry had very helpfully said it actually was a form of torture, that is sleep deprivation. Y/n loved her job - it was all she’d ever really wanted - yet that thought was quickly becoming not enough to get her through the day. Not when it felt like an interrogation tactic used by the CIA. 

To give a quick timeline of the past few days may give a little context:

Thursday - filming the fight scene all day plus an evening-turned-half-the-night-shoot due to some technically difficulties delaying the process.

Friday - flying to New York while doing read throughs of scenes for the next few days; followed immediately by getting glammed and filming the tonight show with Fallon; then a dash across town to the late late show with James Corden; then straight back on a flight to Atlanta that landed at stupid o’clock in the morning

Saturday - a full day of shooting in a mock grand central station set

The press trip to NY had been unplanned… to say the least. But the star of their studios other new release had taken ill - meaning they had slots booked on some of the biggest talk shows in America that would just be abandoned (angering the shows bookers too). It was a waste of perfectly good promo time and since the studio had their two other stars together doing a block of reshoots - it wasn’t a conversation. Much more a call demanding the two of them to be on the plane.

Normally this wouldn’t be such an unmanageable ask either, except the reshoot block was really rather time pressured. You see, the promo tour wasn’t far from beginning meaning they really needed the final film in the can. So really it was a bit of a mess. Just to free up that single day the two were in New York the whole schedule had had to be rejigged - in doing so they’d lost a rare day off too. It was just typical.  

The joys of success hey?

Well, that’s at least what Y/n was making herself think whilst her incredibly talented SFX artist was in the process of crafting a deep wound onto her upper arm. The reason why she would be ‘dripping with blood’ whilst at a train station was beyond Y/n to be honest - she hadn’t been allowed to read a lot of the script so even now as filming was drawing to a close, the story arc of the movie she was headlining was still a little ‘fuzzy’.

“So I watched your ‘spill your guts’ thing on YouTube” Ellie giggled whilst reaching over for more prosthetic putty- a technical term apparently

“I’m glad one of us enjoyed the experience” Y/n replied with a sigh, rolling her eyes at the mischievous smirk on her face - no doubt Ellie took great joy out of seeing her suffer through eating a thousand year old egg. Which Y/n swore the taste of was still in her mouth… and it seemed as though it’d never leave. 

“Oh don’t worry darling I did too” Nelli called over from the next chair along, where she was doing Tom’s makeup for the day of shoots. “Between that and the animals on Fallon, you made a hell of a lot of people laugh last night” Tom’s artist was referencing the fact one of Jimmys other guests was a zookeeper, so at the end of the interview he had you and Tom join in trying not to scream at the snakes and spiders.

“You mean laugh at us?” 

“Well of course darling!” Nelli exclaimed back in an overdramatic bronx accent making all three of the women burst out laughing, Ellie’s unceremonious snorts echoing through the trailer only egged them all on more.

Tom in response, who had otherwise been absent from conversation for the majority of the morning, exclaimed a curse and jumped up in his chair. While you and Ellie collected yourself, Nelli apologised to him.

“Oh sorry love, I’m interrupting your snooze with my uncontrollable comedic gift” She spoke sweetly, even if still taking the moment to flaunt to the other women, as she squeezed his shoulder compassionately.

“No no” Tom waved off her apology, attempting to rub his eye before Nelli swatted his arm away - a stern look for the risk of ruining all her hard work she’d put into making his face look half presentable. 

“I’m impressed you can sleep while they poke you with all these er instruments” Y/n added in, having only just realised Tom had been in a light sleep for god knows how long they’d been in that chair. It did seem a bit unlikely, being able to fall asleep as you were dabbed, prodded and brushed. 

“Maybe you should try though Y/n… your purple eye bags are proving a struggle even for me” Ellie quipped back, now it was Y/n’s turn to give the stern look. Tom took the explain though, shutting her off from whatever kindly meant insult she was about to throw back at her friend. 

“No normally never, I just….” He was cut off by an ear splitting yawn, appearing almost powerful enough to crack his jaw - which would be a disaster, for no one should ruin such a beautiful and sharp jaw line. “…uh-sorry. I just think I ended up taking my NyQuil and DayQuil the wrong way round in the madness of yesterday.” Only Tom, the poor kid often seemed to lacking in any form of common sense - even if those closest to him knew just how intellectual and passionate he could be about the right topic. Affectionately, Nelli scalded his idiocy by jokingly swatting his head with a little tut.

“I can’t believe your still standing then! I’m barely alive and I don’t have any sedatives in my system.” It was true, Y/n was at that stage where every part of her body felt ridiculously heavy… eyes included … eyes especially. 

“But I did sleep on the jet back while your stupid self was studying the script!” Tom replied with a pretty inarguable point - at the time he knew her actions were stupid;  when their flight took off at 11 PM he was certain that the most valuable asset to his ability to act in the reshoots today would be sleep - rather than character development. And he’d tried to convince Y/n that briefly, but gave up. She was bloody stubborn when she wanted to be. 

“Stop competing about who has it worse cos I think it’s me and Nell”Ellie announced - making Nelli agree empathically with her coworker, nodding her head as she looked first to Y/n in her chair then back at Tom.

“Yeh because we have to deal with your unusable faces!!”

After much sarcasm thrown back and fourth, the trailer slowly ebbed it’s way back into serenity and peace as both artists focused on their work. Once Nelli was done she excused herself, Tom staying in the chair in favour of studying (more like staring blankly) at the dialogue for this mornings scenes. His pretence didn’t last long though and while Ellie was busy adding the final touches of fake blood to the now almost completely believable gash that she’d crafted on Y/n’s arm - Y/n had her attention focused the opposite way.

At poor little Tom. He looked so childlike, his slightly puffy eyes looked as if they had weights tied to them - they way he was having fight against gravity to flutter his eyes open, before loosing the next second only for the process to repeat as they dragged downwards. The broad muscles of his neck occasionally seemed to occasionally let up a little, letting his head tilt slowly at first until it gathered enough momentum to throw him off balance. The then sudden movement of his head unconsciously pulling itself back in line caused his eyes to bolt open prior to the whole cycle repeating again. All Y/n wanted to do was let him lay down someone, her heart feeling a tug in her chest just seeing him like that. 

Ellie proclaimed her completion of the wound, leaning back to admire her work before looking to get an affirming nod from Y/n. Yet instead, she was too preoccupied gazing at the boy slouched across from them. “Someone seems a little distracted.” Ellie smirked, finally garnering Y/n’s attention, only feeling more and more smug watching a light tint appear on the actors cheeks. 

“I-well-no… we need to go.” Y/n ignored her words as though nothing had happened, instead rushing off the chair to get Tom out the chair and onto the awaiting set. They had places to be.

|||||||||||||||||||||||||||| (bcos im lazy)

Honestly when the director, Ed, called for lunch break, it was pretty apparent to be purely as a compassionate gesture to Y/n and Tom. Both of them had tried so hard this morning to fully commit, even so they’d both been almost completely useless. Y/n kept missing cues whilst all Tom’s actions and lines where slow, dragged out and at times completely prompted from someone behind the cameras. 

So when the lunch break was called there was only one thing on Y/n’s mind and what sandwich was available in the mess tent was not it. Still standing on the set next to her fake holdall bag she looked toward Tom, who was pulling himself up to standing from the train station bench - the pace of his movement making him look more like an old man. 

“You good?” His answer was predictable. 

“I’m so fucking shattered”

Tom swore he’d never heard anything sweeter come out of Y/n’s pink lips than her next statement.

“C’mon I know somewhere we can lie down.”

Without any sort of thought Tom blindly agreed, nodding as he took her outstretched hand in his. The gesture in itself brought a fresh wave of comfort to his aching limbs and as his feet stumbled to catchup with her slight head start he leant the majority of his weight into their connected hands. 

Neither would admit it but they were ‘a thing’… whatever the hell that meant. It was clear as day to everyone and anyone that worked closely to the two but neither of them had ever broached the topic with each other. They’d worked on a few films together over the years; each time they got closer and closer to the point any job without the other simply wasn’t as good. It was scary though, especially for two actors in the prime of their careers. If they weren’t working the same film they’d likely be the opposite side of the world to each other most of the time - quality time together would be few and far between, Really their jobs didn’t suit dating at all, yet it would be perhaps easier if one half of it worked a ‘normal’ job. Something with consistency, a regular structure. A level of dependability that neither Y/n nor Tom could offer to the other. 

So it was terrifying, acknowledging the growth in their magnetic attraction to each other. Both were acutely aware that doing that, confronting their feelings, would most likely signal the beginning of the end. 

Although none of this stoped Y/n from returning the gesture, tilting her shoulder into Tom’s left side as they took slow steps through and then out the set building. She steered the two past the hair and makeup trailer and round into a store and extra equipment trailer. Tom tilted his head as she climbed the stairs whilst beckoning for him to follow - it didn’t seem like the most obvious choice. Rolling her eyes, Y/n explained.

“It’s where all the blankets and coats and kept for the raining scenes plusssss no one will disturb us in here.” Again Tom was not in a position to disagree, eyes drooping as his shoulders sagged to the floor. Right now he’d take anything. 

So he climbed up the stairs and shut the door behind him, just as Y/n flipped the light on. She was right, it was well equipped and with an almost mountainous supply of red blankets that normally the crew and extra would all be wrapped up in after the freezing rain scenes with all the ‘waterfall machines’ as Y/n called them. However it was also um…. It was cosy. “Oh I don’t think I realised how small it was” She chuckled lightly, since now the door was closed her back was pressed up against the far wall of cabinets and still her front was mere millimetres from Tom.

“I…I don’t mind… if-if you don’t?”

“I’m too tired to care” She giggled in response, and Tom , now with her seal of approval, immediately started ransacking the piled shelves for all their worth creating a floor carpeted in the pale red of the blankets, in an attempt to make it more cosy. Joining in, it was almost remarkable how quickly their bodies suddenly agreed to move, with the new promise of rest mere moments away. 

Once the trailer was fully drowned, Tom kicked off his costume shoes and threw his jacket off - it haphazardly landing by the doorway. Y/n copied him, leaving her stood up whilst he had the advantaged of already settling down on the floor, her standing and looking down at him.

The space between the two opposing shelving units was not close spacious enough for two people to lie down whilst keeping a respectable level of personal space. Suddenly feeling a wave of awkwardness, Y/n stayed standing, wringing her hands slightly - whilst fairly certain Tom could hear her heart running at 100 mph. 

“You er… gonna stay there or?” Tom, contrary to popular belief, wasn’t a complete idiot - he could see she was suddenly self conscious. He got it too - they’d never crossed this boundary of choosing to cuddle into each other. It had happened once of twice accidentally over there 2 years of knowing each other. Both of those times it was completely accidental, falling asleep watching a movie with a safe distance of space b between the two, only to find hours later their bodies almost completely intwined. Tom would be lying if he said that his heart didnt skip a beat when he had awoken to Y/n’s soft and gently breath fanning into his neck. He’d loved it, but understood that was unconsciously breaking down part of the wall they’d both been the constructors of.

For fear of getting hurt. 

So now, as Y/n awkwardly bent down and lay on her side, he thought it was imperative to make her feel comfortable. Naturally then, his arm slid round her shoulders and pulled her down toward his chest, releasing a little breath as he felt her relax, her legs slowly wrapping round one of his. 

“This okay?” He murmured, now into the crown of her head as she lay half on her side half on his chest. In reply she nodded into him and Tom couldn’t help but grin- unbeknownst to him but Y/n was doing the exact same thing. 

The peace lasted all of 3 seconds until she groaned again.

“What?” Tom enquired as she wriggled out his hold and stood up. Instead of replying though she just leant over and flicked the one harsh light bulb off making Tom chuckle as she fumbled her way back onto the padded floor in the darkness, earning a few grunts from both as she accidentally kicked Tom’s thighs or banged her head on one of the now empty shelves. Fumbling her way back into a comfortable position, occasionally cursing when she stubbed her toe- or Tom did when she accidentally elbowed him in the ribs. 

“Comfy?” Tom asked a little sarkily as he squeezed her a little more into his side.

“Mhmmmm… I’m gonna sleep for 100 years”

“Yeh me… me too”

And with that they both almost instantly and in complete unison sagged into each other and the blankets - the pent up stress and tension of the past few days ebbing away.

What the pair had neglected to remember was that sleeping for 100 years wasn’t really an option. The whole crew of 50 people, who wanted to restart filming after 45 minutes, had not been told about Y/n’s little hiding place. The pair were so completely safe in their own little cocoon of comfort they were completely oblivious to their teams calling there names more and more frantically. Completely oblivious to the game of hide and seek the situation had descended into, completely oblivious to Harrys natural annoyance as the director asked him for the whereabouts of the two stars - as though Harry was childminder to the pair of them.

It was Nelli who found them first. She’d and Ellie and Tom’s manager had all been recruited by Harry as part of the man hunt. Both girls, having seen first hand the state of the two this morning, were fairly certain they’d both crashed out somewhere. So Nelli, already with a sneaking suspicion, opened the door gently, her figure blocking the majority of the light from seeping through to the dimly lit inside. The sight she was met with had her actually pouting at the cuteness - and yes its a cringey word but also the only one appropriate.

Between bedding down and barely an hour later the two had managed to become impossibly tighter pressed to each other. Y/n’s face was pressed into the crook of Tom’s neck and his arms seemed to have pulled her on-top of him almost completely. Her left leg was hooked under his right, which was then sandwiched by his left too. They both looked so pure and innocent and god did Nelli know they both needed any extra time they could get.

Nelli cared a lot about Tom, she’d been working with him from the beginning, from the child star days to now. She cared about him like her very annoying surrogate son and she wanted to see him looked after. She also so completely wanted the two stars to stop pining after each other. Because frankly it was getting a little frustrating for everyone else. 

So she chose to tactically forget about her discovery, sneaking a photo on the sly before silently pulling the door closed and leaving them to their sleep. 

#tom holland #tom holland fluff #tom holland x reader #tom holland x famous!reader #tom holland x actress!reader #fluff

[wildlittlefoxsworld]

My world crashed almost into pieces | The Old Guard | Andy x Fem!Reader

A/N: So, something new from me ;) I hope you like it and have fun. I think it's not easy to write Andy as a character, she has no many facettes and she is a strong and brave woman, but I try to protray his soft side mostly in my stories. So, that's for everyone who likes soft Andy ❤

Summary: You get injured on a mission and you doesn't wake up. Andy waits anixously for you come back. When you heal she doesn't leave your side and shows you all her love for you.

Warnings: tempory reader's death, major angst

TOG Masterlist

***

„Don’t you dare to leave me,“ she mumbled again and again while watching your body didn’t show any signs of healing. If she must bet, she would say fourty percent of your skin was burnt and from the impact of the explosion you were flung backwards, so you suffered a few broken and silvered bones that cut through skin.

Andy was full of your blood and the car seats were stained as well, but she didn’t care, all she wanted was you to come back and open your pretty eyes. Joe was driving like a mad-man to get away from the men that were following you in black jeeps and Nicky and Booker leaned out of the windows to fire back.

Andy took your injured hand in hers and was careful so she didn’t crash it. Your face was deep red and the raw flesh was stretched over your skull. Of course you died; no human body could survive an explosion, the injuries were too much. She was grateful that Joe handled fast enough and had lifted you in his arms, because all of you needed to get away there as fast as possible. The whole mission was a disaster and she hoped that you didn’t have to pay a price for that.

“Come, babe, wake up. Don’t leave me,” she begged you and felt the tears forming in her eyes. You were on her side for over two thousand years now and when her time hadn’t come yet, then it couldn’t be your time to die now. She wouldn’t know what to do when you wouldn’t revive. You were her whole world and to lose you would break her heart into pieces. Only the thought of a life without you made it hard for her to breathe. She blinked her tears away, but there came only more.

The car ride went chaotic, but Joe succeeded in leaving the jeeps behind them. He looked in the rear-view mirror and met Andy’s gaze. She shook the head slowly and Joe growled angrily. Andy knew that he would be by her side if you wouldn’t make it and she would take revenge, but she didn’t want to think about this scenario. She still had faith that you will come back to her.

The group arrived at one of their many safehouses, well it was just a small cabin, but better than nothing. Andy planned to go here after the mission one way or another, but she never thought that it would be the four of them and your dead body.

“How is she doing?” Nicky asked worriedly and opened the door to lean over your face. He hoped to find any signs of you starting healing. He could imagine how Andy felt in the moment, he wouldn't feel different if it would be Joe. Andy was focused on your face as well and stroked your unharmed right forearm.

“How long?” Joe whispered from the driver seat after he turned around.

“Too long,” Andy replied with trembling lips. “Maybe half an hour already. Why isn’t she healing?”

“She has probably inner injuries too. You know that big wounds need longer to heal. She will be fine,” Nicky assured her and Andy looked hopeful at him. Nicky always found the right words to calm her down, but the waiting stressed her immensely.

Your family waited impatiently that you started to heal. The seconds and minutes were crawling slowly and the silence was unbearable. Andy would give everything she had to hear your laugh again.

The noise when your bones began to crack back in their places and your skin grew back over the red flesh, let Andy flinch, but all of them let out a sigh of relief. Andy didn’t notice that she held her breath the whole time since Nicky spoke.

“Now it won’t take any longer, only a few seconds,” Joe said smiling slightly.

Andy nodded slowly, but never kept her eyes of you, she watched how your body healed in every place that was injured and she laughed weakly when you took your first breath. Your eyes flattered open and you tried to focus on anything. You looked directly at her.

Your whole body hurt when you came back to life. In one moment you killed a man who tried to attack Nicky from behind and in the next moment everything went black. You knew you had died, but you recognized that you lay with your head in Andy’s lap and she was watching you worriedly. You noticed tears on her cheeks and now you were really confused.

“Why are your eyes so red?” you asked confused and knitted your eyebrows together, but you received no answer and Andy’s arms wrapped around your upper body to pull her close to her chest. Your face was buried in the crook of her neck while Andy was rocking back and forward with you.

You were sure something went horribly wrong that made Andy so emotional, because she was hugging you desperately and caressed your hair tenderly. “You’re okay, you’re here,” she whispered again and again more to herself than to you.

“Yes, I’m good, Andy. What happened?” you asked and your voice was muffled. She didn’t let go and you decided to hug her back. You wrapped your arms around her waist and squeezed her gently, to let her know you were there and it would be okay whatever got her so sad and worried. But it seemed your words made it only worse, because Andy began to shake with sobs.

She laid a hand on your cheek and made you looking at her. “Don’t you ever do this again to me,” she said sternly and kissed your forehead for a long moment, she didn't care that there was blood everywhere on your new healed skin. Andy didn’t want to talk about what happened to you. All she wanted was holding you in her arms and listening to your frequent breathing and your steady heartbeat. Your body had been so cold, but now the warmth was spreading in your torso and limbs, but Andy still needed a few minutes to realize that you weren’t dead anymore.

A rock in the size of the Mount Everest fell from her heart the second you openend your eyes. She never felt so happy in her entire life and she would never let go of you again. Never keeping her of you again. Not ever letting anyone hurt again.

“We should go inside. The both of you need a hot bath,” you heard Nicky’s voice and you thought that you must sat in a car with Andy and the others. Slowly the whole situation made sense to you and you assumed that you took too long to revive from the death. But there would be no chance that Andy would explain everything to you, because she didn’t answer your question the first time and you knew her well enough that it meant she didn't want to talk about it.

“Nicky is right, Andromache,” you tried to get her attention and she shifted carefully with you in her arms. She went out of the car, but never let go of you and helped you to stand on your feet. She studied you intensely and wrapped an arm around your middle to push you gently in direction of the small cabin.

You didn't complain when she lead you straight into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. You walked over to the mirror and looked at yourself.

“I look awful,” you commented giggling your reflection, but Andy shook her head. She reached for your shoulders to peel off the rest of your remaining clothes. It stuck to your skin and you felt dirty and itchy. You needed a hot shower and Andy had the same idea in her mind, when she pushed you wordlessly under warn water. A few seconds later a pair of arms wrapped around your body and Andy nuzzled her face to your neck. You weren't used to so much affection from her. Naturally she showed affection when you were alone or when she had a very good day then in front of your family too, but now she was desperate to touch you, feeling you close to her.

“I'm fine, my heart.”

She hugged you harder and started to place kisses on the side of your neck. You turned around in her arms and dug your fingers in her upper arms. She watched you attentive and her eyes still showed worry, pain, sadness, but there was as well relief and her love for you. You understood that she almost lost you today.

“I'm fine,” you reassured her and you leaned your forehead against hers. “You won't lose me, ever, my heart belongs to you and I will be always by your side.”

Andy wasn't good with words, bur her actions showed more than thousand words. She raised a hand and her fingers traced over your eyebrows, cheeks, the soft curve of your lips, her thumb opened your mouth with gentle pressure and then she kissed your lips. Your mouths met from time to time in soft kisses until they moved slowly and sensual. Andy treated you like you could break from the slightest touch of her, but on the other side she wanted to caress all the parts that were injured, feeling only smooth and flawless skin.

Your spine tingled in anticipation when you pulled back and saw Andy's eyes were a few shades darker. The worry was replaced with lust and adoration, her kisses grew deeper and passionately, her hand in the small of your back made you upper body aching and her tongue find the way in your mouth. You will give her everything that she needed and she could take everything that she wanted.

“I was barely so scared in my entire life,” she muttered and the confession took her a lot of bravery, but it didn't matter, she didn't need to be brave or strong in the moment, not here with you.

You didn't answer anything, you simply hugged her with your arms around her shoulders and stood in silence with water raining down on you that turned pink on the way down.

Clean from the dirt and blood you went in the small bedroom that you shared everytime you came to the cabin. She tugged you under the blankets and cuddled you from behind in a firm grip like she thought you could disappear when she fell asleep.

You found sleep while listening to her breathing. You felt secure and happy to be with the woman that meant… well, there wasn't existing any words to describe your love for Andy. She was your other half and the constant in your life. Your feelings grew over the centuries for her into a love so deep that no ocean was big enough to contain it.

Andy whispered lovely words and sweet nothings in your ear what woke you up slowly and you felt the kisses on your face, neck, clevage and chest. Her hands caressed your heated skin from under the blankets and pressed to her hot body so long.

“I need you,” she stated clearly with authority in her voice. You were surprised for a moment, but the worry was back in her eyes and you nodded in agrerment.

“You got a bad dream?” you asked softly. She kissed you desperately as an answer to show you her need to be close to you.

“I'm here. We're both safe here,” you reassured her, whispering against her lips and Andy claimed your mouth again and again. You knew she didn't want to talk, only touch and feel you.

***

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#the old guard #the old guard fanfic #the old guard x reader #andy x reader #andromache the scythian x reader #nicolo di genova #yusuf x nicolo #andromache the scythian

[even-after-a-millennia]

my heart (and lungs) ache for you

Femslash Fortnight: Tuesday - Hanahaki disease AU

For those of you that haven't read a Hanahaki disease AU before, the basic premise is that unrequited love makes flowers bloom in your lungs and they will kill you if you don't tell the person that you love them or if they don't return your feelings. You can get surgery to remove the flowers, but it also takes your feelings for that person away, so many people don't go that route. The flowers usually have meaning, same in this fic, and the meanings are at the end of the fic. Hope you enjoy!

This was written for Femslash Fortnight, hosted by @tog-femslashfortnight

You can read this fic down below or over on my Ao3 account here.

Yusuf and Nicolò burst into Quynh and Andromache’s cell, covered in blood and ready to spill more, to find a lone woman slumped against the wall.

She looked up at them, her eyes dead.

“It’s too late,” she croaked.

Their eyes widened as they took in her words.  The blood on her wrists, the floor.  The lack of their other sister.

“...Quynh?” Yusuf asked, his voice quivering.  They are both shaking in front of her, the adrenaline of their fighting crashing in the worst possible way.  

“Gone,” Andromache said, her voice twisted and broken.  “And… that’s not all.”

She coughed and a bloody flower falls from her lips.

She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to watch as all she had revealed sunk in.  

She far preferred the darkness found behind her eyelids than the reality in front of her.

___________________________________

Andy had died two hundred and forty-nine times from the disease in her lungs by the time that Nile joined her group.  While her body reset with every death, whether it had to do with Hanahaki or not, the flowers always came back.  A bitter reminder of the one she had lost.

The first time she coughed up a petal around Nile, they were eating their first meal altogether.  Nile’s eyes were darting around, unsure where to look.  Joe and Nicky had told their story, so had Booker.  Nile asked her how old Andy was.  Her chest tightened and she put down her bowl.  The men at the table knew what was coming, but Andy still saw Nicky’s brow furrow as she began to cough.  He had been to college multiple times for medicine, trying to find a way to alleviate her pain.  There was nothing he could do.  Not anything, not without Quynh there.  And though they had searched for her until they had almost lost themselves, there was no sign of the iron coffin that had become her tomb.

Nile stared at Andy, then the bloody petal in her hand.

“Better get used to it, kid, it isn’t something that can be fixed,” Andy said.

Joe winced and Booker handed Andy his flask.  She took it and chugged a mouthful, hoping the taste of carnations would be washed away.

She’d had countless kinds of flowers emerge from her chest over the centuries: pink camellias, forget-me-nots, salvias, yarrow… the list went on.  Eventually, she stopped looking up their meanings.

They all came down to this: Andy loved Quynh to this day, and she ached to have her back by her side.

“Is it… not requited?” Nile asked tentatively.

Andy snorted.

“Not in the traditional sense,” Nicky said, taking the responsibility of answering.  “Andy’s wife is unable to return her love and that is why she is still sick.”

“Oh.  Okay.”

“Tell her about when you two idiots both had it,” Booker said, and Andy looked at him and sent him silent thanks.

Joe smiled, his eye wrinkles out in their full glory.  “This is years after the Crusades, and one morning, I wake up with heliotropes dripping from my lips.  I didn’t want to tell Nicky, so I hid them from him.”

“Little did he know that earlier that day, before he had woke, I had coughed up violet petals,” Nicky said, smiling over at his husband.

“Stupidity ensued,” Booker said with a small grin.

“Until one day we both coughed in front of one another and noticed the flowers.  It took a while for us both to admit our feelings.  Didn’t help that I was angry at the idea that someone out there didn’t love Nicky back,” Joe said, laughing.

“Only for us to realize that we had both thought our love to be unrequited when in reality, it very much was,” Nicky said.

Andy shook her head, taking another swig of Booker’s flask before handing it back.  

“Idiots,” she said with a small smile.

_______________________________

Her shoulder wasn’t healing.

Her fingers came away red after she brushed them over the stab wound.  It was partially healed, but still bleeding sluggishly.  She quickly left the mine and went to the nearest town.

She grabbed all the first aid supplies she could think she would need.  It had been a long fucking time since she had needed to patch herself up after a fight, but she had done field medicine on others, on mortals, much more recently.

In the end, she didn’t need to.  In her six thousand years of life, Andy had somehow forgotten about the kindness of strangers.

“We also have cough drops, if you would like,” the woman, Celeste, said as she helped Andy put on her coat again.

“Thank you.  That would be good.”

Andy got back to her car and shut the door behind her.  Her lungs were burning, but she didn’t let herself cough.  She had died on the killing room floor just a few days ago, so she had a while before the disease got bad again.  A few petals here and there, then full flowers, until she was unable to breathe around the growth in her lungs.  The longest she had made it from the beginnings of the disease to her inevitable death was nine months.

When she was immortal, that had hardly mattered.  

Now though… 

Now she was running out of time.

__________________________________

“Hey, if they can examine the Hanahaki in your lungs, they might be able to find a way to stop it.  And I can finally move on and be with my family.  It could work out for both of us.”

Her side bled and bled and bled.

“Oh, Book.”  There were tears clogging her throat, petals right behind them.  

“What have you done?”

_________________________________

Bloody flowers fell from Andy’s lips.

“Fuck.”

The sentiment was echoed around their safe house.

Nile, Joe, and Nicky were all staring and trying not to stare as Andy went to the kitchen and made a cup of tea to soothe her throat.  

She had been drinking a lot of tea these days.  And taking a lot of naps.  And sleeping in general.  When she was awake, she felt lethargic.  She had bruised her ribs from coughing so much and her throat was constantly inflamed.

It had been seven months since they had left Booker at that pub.  Andy felt twinges of emotion about it daily, though the emotion itself changed constantly.  Grief, anger, understanding, betrayal, sadness.  They all flowed through her.

Nile’s phone rang.

“Hello?” she asked, her voice curious but guarded.  “Book?  WHAT?!”

They all focused on her.

She looked up, directly at Andy.

“Quynh got out of the coffin.  She’s been recovering with Book for a month,” Nile said, her eyes filling with tears.

Her smile made them spill over, it was so big and full of hope.

“She wants to see you again.”

“Andy,” Nicky said gently, ever the voice of reason, “if you see her and she doesn’t return your love, it will accelerate the disease.  You will die in days, not weeks.”

Andy nodded, glad of the fact that no mention of surgery was mentioned.  Surgically taking out the flowers inside Andy’s lungs would remove the disease, but also remove her ability to love Quynh anymore.

And that really wasn’t an option for Andy.

“I’ll risk it.  At least…” she trailed off, her thoughts too private to be spoken.

At least I’ll die having seen her again.

By the looks on her family’s faces, split between fear and hope, they knew what she had thought anyways.

_______________________________

They went to France.  Marseille, specifically, and Andy let herself be glad that Booker had gone to his home city.  It gave her hope for him.

They let themselves into the safe house, Nile insisting on going first.

“I don’t think it is a trap, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t be smart about this,” she said.

Andy knew that Joe, Nicky, and Nile were all carrying a small army’s worth of weaponry, but she hadn’t bothered.  She would live or she would die, one way or another, and she did not want to raise a weapon against Quynh in her final moments.

They entered, the others scanning the room for threats.  But there was only Booker, slouched into himself as usual.

“Hey.  She’s right through-”

“Andromache…” whispered the voice Andy hadn’t heard in five hundred years.

Her eyes snapped to the source and there stood Quynh in black skinny jeans and a deep red sweater, her eyes flinty as she looked at them.

Her smile wasn’t warm, but it wasn’t cruel.  “Hello, my love.”

Andy felt something building in her chest and she sprinted to the nearest garbage can, and coughed and coughed and coughed.  Petals and buds and flowers came pouring out of her lungs.  She felt a soft hand on her back, soothing her through the pain, but she couldn’t tell who it was.

The final carnation fell from her lips and she slumped over the trash can.

She heaved a breath, the first that didn’t burn her lungs since Quynh had been taken from her.

Wiping her mouth on her sleeve, she rose and turned to Quynh.

Her expression was fractured from what it had been.  Andy could now see beneath the anger to the Quynh she knew before.

“Hanahaki?” Quynh asked.

Andy nodded.  “Since you were taken from me.”

“And still you stopped searching.”

Andy stared straight at Quynh as she said, “Yes.”

“You are mortal now.”

“Yes.”

“And yet, you did not search for me in your final days.”

“That, actually, is not true,” Andy said.  “With resources provided by Copley, we have been.  Only to find out, you weren’t where we were searching.”

Quynh’s mouth twisted, but Andy knew her face, knew it more than her own, and she saw how she tried to hide her trembling bottom lip.  “You could have died, and I would not have seen you again.”

“But that did not happen,” Andy said, risking a step forward.

“I am here,” she said, taking another step.

“And so are you.”  Yet another.

“And you still love me, despite everything.”  Closer.

“Or else I would be choking on flowers right now, my final death.” Andy was a foot away and finally stopped.

“We have a chance to spend my remaining days together.  It won’t be an eternity, but it will be more than I ever expected to be able to have.  I know we have much to discuss and many traumas to bear, but I want you, Quynh.  I want you with me until the end.”

“Just you and me,” Quynh said, eyes fixed on Andy.

Taking a chance, Andy leaned her head forward, until their foreheads rested against each other.  

“Always,” Andy whispered.

Flower meanings: Red carnation - Alas for my poor heart, my heart aches Camellia, pink - Longing For You Forget-me-not - True love memories, do not forget me Salvia, blue - I think of you Salvia, red - Forever mine Yarrow - Everlasting love Heliotrope - Eternal love, devotion Violet - Loyalty, devotion, faithfulness

#andromaquynh #andy x quynh #andromache the scythian #andy #quynh #fanfic #my fic #tog femslash fortnight #hanahaki disease

[rawiswhore]

Serotonin (TNA) x Fem Reader- "Raven's Cock"

Hello.

I would like to apologize on why I didn't post anything on Monday.

I did type a fanfic on Monday but didn't finish it, and I tried finishing it yesterday but I got frustrated typing it, and I'm not sure if I should finish that fanfic or not.

The fanfic is inspired by that Internet meme of porn star Piper Perri sitting down on a couch while 5 black men are standing behind her and that couch.

I've even made my own parody of that Piper Perri meme that has wrestlers I have crushes on sitting behind that same couch while Trish Stratus is sitting on that couch, I've thought of making my parody the border image for this blog as well as posting it.

____________________________________________________________

A wrestler named Raven really made a name for himself when he was in 2 alternate wrestling companies to the World Wrestling Federation during the 90's: WCW and ECW.

However, as the new millennium entered, WCW and ECW went out of business, although Raven was no longer in those companies by the time they went bankrupt.

He didn't really seem to get pushed and used that much when he was in the World Wrestling Federation, which was the most famous wrestling company in the world and still is today, although it's now known as the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment).

He eventually sued the WWE and left the company, but he did have a short stint in another alternate wrestling company, Ring of Honor, as well as join the 2nd biggest competitive wrestling company in the 2000's: TNA.

TNA, which stood for Total Nonstop Action for you people with dirty minds, was like a more violent and sexual WCW: not only was it an alternative to the WWF/E, but TNA had wrestling icons joining that company like Hulk Hogan, Mick Foley, Sting, Booker T, Scott Hall/Razor Ramon, Rob Van Dam, Jeff Hardy and more, as well as newcomer wrestlers such as AJ Styles and Samoa Joe.

WCW used to have wrestling legends join that company (Hulk Hogan, Macho Man Randy Savage, Scott Hall, Ultimate Warrior, Curt Hennig/Mr. Perfect, Rowdy Roddy Piper), as well as have up and coming wrestlers who would eventually become legends (Sting, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Triple H, Booker T, Goldberg, Eddie Guerrero).

During Raven's time in TNA, he formed a short lived faction known as Serotonin, a group of men who wore face paint, torture people by burning their skin with candlewax, and hit people with kendo sticks.

The members didn't just include Raven, but also Shawn Michaels' cousin Michael Shane, Frank Kazarian and Johnny Devine.

Serotonin were almost like a wrestling version of the droogs from "A Clockwork Orange".

The men from Serotonin were hot, even though you prefer Michael Shane when he didn't wear makeup and Johnny Devine without that stripe across his eyes, as well as Raven during his WCW and ECW days.

Seeing some of the things Serotonin did in TNA looked rather, eh...kinky. Sexual.

During Serotonin's time in TNA, you shared with the members of Serotonin an idea you had involving them.

They figured you had that idea when you watched them, but they don't mind this idea, in fact, they'd love to act this out.

Sometime during Serotonin's heyday circa 2006/2007, you invited the members of that group to your hotel room, as well as brought along the props for this rendezvous.

The hotel room was rather dark, no lights turned on, fitting the mood for tonight's orgy.

After Serotonin had entered your hotel room and shut the door, before they could do what you wanted them to do to you, they were putting on their makeup they wear in TNA in the bathroom.

They were already dressed like how they dress as Serotonin, but now they need some makeup to apply.

Michael Shane had his long hair hanging down, not tied back in a ponytail, and Johnny Devine had makeup that made him look good and not ugly.

When their makeup was done, they walked out of the bathroom and approached you, where Raven stood behind you with his arms wrapped around your waist, holding you tight and refusing to let go of you.

One of his fingers wrapped around his forearm, embracing you tight.

He lifted you off of the floor, where your legs and feet were kicking like you wanted to be let go.

The other members of Serotonin began shedding and peeling your clothes off, sliding your clothes down your arms and hands as well as your legs, undressing you until you were stark naked, throwing your clothes on the floor.

You aren't being raped, you're roleplaying.

You didn't scream since you don't want people next door to hear you and think you're getting raped.

Would Serotonin ever be savage enough to rape someone on TNA? Hmmmmmm...

Is it necessary for you to roleplay as if you're getting gangraped and having your clothes peeled off?

Serotonin could also easily take scissors and cut them off of your body, or use a switchblade and tear the clothes off of you.

Once you were undressed, they ordered you to get down on your knees.

You obeyed them, sinking down to the carpeted floor and standing on your knees.

Frank Kazarian, who was known as Kaz in Serotonin, undid his pants by unbuttoning and unzipping them, where he slid his hand down his pants and pulled his cock out.

After he pulled his dick out, he grabbed a scarf sitting on the bed and wrapped and tied it around your wrist, where he pulled that scarf and lifted up both your hand and arm.

As he tied a scarf around your wrist, Johnny Devine, who was known as Havok in Serotonin, unbuttoned and unzipped his pants, pulling his pants down and letting his genitals out.

Havok pulled a scarf out of the pocket of his pants and wrapped and tied a scarf around your wrist, lifting your arm and hand up by pulling up that scarf.

Michael Shane, known as Martyr in Serotonin, was standing right in front of you, unbuttoning and unzipping his pants and pulling them down, letting his private parts out.

Raven was behind you, he was busy undoing his white pants and pulling his cock out.

Kaz and Havok held the scarves and didn't let go, your arms were standing up in the air.

Martyr wrapped his fingers around his shaft, which was getting harder and rising up more seeing your naked body, and slowly inserted his penis into your mouth.

Martyr was probably the hottest member in Serotonin, that's why you're sucking on his cock while the other 2 tied scarves around your wrists.

You took his cock in your mouth, wrapping your lips around his shaft, where you proceeded to suck his dick.

While you sucked his penis, Havok and Kaz had their fingers wrapped around their shafts, although not each others shafts, like Kaz's fingers around Havok's erection, where they held their penises and directed and pointed the tips of their penises at your face, where they proceeded to start masturbating over your face.

Their penises were as close to your face as possible, nearly wanting to poke your cheeks (but not penetrate and pierce through them) on your face with their penis heads.

Since they want their precum to get on your face, they moved their dicks closer until their penis heads were poking and touching the cheeks on your face.

Hopefully you'll get precum on your face.

Raven was standing behind you, wrapping his fingers around his big hard cock, and letting his penis overlap over your forehead and on top of your head.

When you sucked on Martyr's penis, precum leaked out of his slit and spilled onto your tongue, sometimes behind your bottom row of teeth.

But you managed to swallow his precum when you could.

Martyr unwrapped his fingers off of his shaft and placed his fingers on your nipples, where he tweaked and pinched them.

You have very sensitive nipples, and you whimpered and moaned while Martyr tweaked your nips.

Precum escaped out of Havok and Kaz's slits and landed on your face, sometimes their precum ran down their shafts.

Their precum on your face ran down your cheeks like tears.

Despite that they were busy masturbating with one hand, their other hands were still gripping onto the scarves holding your arms up.

And the scarves didn't untie while they held them.

Since you're afraid you'll get precum in your eyes which hurts, you shut your eyes just in case,.

Raven, on the other hand, began to masturbate his penis, pumping his fingers up and down his shaft, where precum eventually poured out of his slit and onto your face.

"You've been a bad girl, haven't ya?" Raven purred, his voice sounding husky and warm, his face leaning into the side of your head.

"Mmmmhmmmmm" you replied, nodding your head.

Raven had a paddle in one of his hands, a wooden paddle used for spanking, and while he held that paddle horizontally, the paddle quickly crashed into your ass cheeks like a car crashing into a wall, pressing onto your ass and turning it pink.

You slightly jumped up and wanted to cry when Raven's paddle hit your ass.

He pulled that paddle a few inches away from your ass, only to quickly collide that paddle into your ass again, the paddle hitting both of your ass cheeks.

Tears could nearly well in your eyes from the pain.

The paddle began to separate away from your ass a few times, only to bash your ass again, and he did this over and over again.

When he spanked you, sometimes the paddle hit one ass cheek, other times it hit both of them.

He hit you with that paddle like how he hits people with kendo sticks in TNA, letting out his fury as he spanked your ass.

Your knees were burning and chafing from standing on the carpeted floor.

Raven's precum trickled out of his slit and ran down your face, he's spanking you while still jerking off.

Now that's talent.

You're trying to control yourself not to bite Martyr's penis as Raven spanks you.

Will people next door hear you getting spanked? Hopefully not.

All of the members of Serotonin were looking at your face, they were smiling and grinning seeing your face drenched in cum.

When you had enough precum on your face, Kaz and Havok moved and directed their penises to your breasts, where they still continued masturbating their dicks.

Their penis tips were as close to your tits as possible, their penis heads nudging your breasts.

Precum leaked from their slits and dripped onto your chest, running down your tits looking like melted candlewax.

Your ass cheeks keep turning pinkish red with every smack they get from that paddle, and hopefully you won't get splinters on your rear end.

Raven's had enough with spanking your ass, although he wants a chance to jizz on your tits, so does Martyr.

Martyr pulled his cock out of your mouth for a while, only to aim and point his dick at one of your breasts.

He still continued masturbating his penis, pumping up and down his shaft, precum being released from his slit and landing on your breast.

Raven wants you to suck on his big juicy cock, although he also wants to jack off on your breasts as well.

When Martyr felt like he masturbated enough on one of your tits, he moved his dick to your other breast, where he still jacked off his shaft.

His penis was aiming at your other tit, nudging your breast.

Likewise, precum leaked out of his slit and fell on your breast, his precum sliding down your tit.

Raven walked in front of you and asked for these other Serotonin members to move over, Raven hasn't gotten a chance to masturbate on your breasts.

Havok moved a few steps horizontally to make room for Raven, where Raven held his penis and pointed it at one of your tits.

He jacked his dick off, pumping it until some precum was released out of his slit and onto your breast.

His shaft was slippery thanks to precum running down it, and he masturbated until he felt like he jizzed enough on one of your breasts.

He then directed his dick to your other breast, still pumping up and down his shaft.

Precum dripped out of his slit and dropped on your breast, now so many mixture of Serotonin's precum is running down your tits and face.

Martyr, on the other hand, hasn't gotten a chance to jack off on your face, so he lifted his penis up to your face by still holding on to it and continued masturbating his dick.

Martyr held his penis to your face, pointing it close enough to your face, where precum did fall out of his slit and onto your face, some of it dripping down your mouth.

He held his penis to your nose, you haven't really been bukakke'd on your face besides perhaps when Raven jacked off on your forehead.

With precum running down your breasts and face, it looks like candlewax.

Raven ordered you to open your mouth as well as lean your head back, and you listened to him, leaning your head back and opening and widening your mouth as much as you could.

Raven, Havok and Kaz lifted their cocks and pointed their penis tips at your mouth, whereas Martyr moved his penis to your mouth.

They continued masturbating, aiming their dicks at your mouth, hoping precum will fall in there.

Some precum did slip out of their slits and into your mouth, and that's what they as well as you want.

They grinned and looked at your face while they masturbated into your mouth, and you swallowed any precum that dropped into your mouth.

You wish you could have someone behind you right now, and speak of the devil...

Raven then walked around Havok and placed himself behind you, where he now crouched on the floor.

As Raven was behind you, he placed his hands on your breasts and began to caress and squeeze them, rubbing them until the precum rubbed into your skin.

Their precum disappeared as it was rubbed in your flesh, seeping into your skin.

When Raven rubbed your breasts with precum drenched on them, he leaned and buried his face on the side of your neck, where his teeth took a nibble of your skin on your neck.

He sucked your skin while it was slightly in his mouth, he growled a bit while he sucked your skin.

His teeth bit your skin rather hard, almost giving you a hickey.

In fact, he is giving you a hickey. He'll give you many of them.

Your moans have been rather breathy while Raven does this to you.

Martyr, Havok and Kaz would love to have turns where they rub the precum on your breasts until it seeps into your skin, but maybe that can be for next time.

When the precum on your breasts seeped into your skin and disappeared, Martyr walked away and grabbed a candle, he brought with him one of those sex candles that isn't dangerous.

Havok brought a lighter with him and slid his hand into his pocket, pulling out a lighter and turning it on, a little flame coming out of the flicker.

Martyr held the candle up to the lighter, where the little flame lit the top of the candle.

Raven saw that Martyr lit that candle, so he now moved his hands off of your breasts since he doesn't want to get candlewax on his hands, for now, anyway.

Martyr moved that candle he was holding carefully to your chest, where he tilted that candle above one of your breasts, as close to one of your tits, but not trying to let the fire burn your tit.

Candlewax did begin to drip down that candle as well as drop onto one of your tits.

You flinched when the wax hit your tit, although at least it isn't an actual candle.

The wax burned your skin and you can feel the heat from the flame on top of that candle close to you.

Pretty soon, more candlewax began to drip on your breast, and as it fell onto your tit, one of Raven's hands slipped in between your thighs, where one of the tips of his fingers began to play with your clit.

His finger rubbed your clitoris in circles as well as sometimes pressed on it, his finger rubbed you across horizontally as well as vertically.

Your twat was so moist as Raven slipped his finger in between your vulva.

You had so much anxiety as candlewax was dripping on your tit and a lit candle was so close to you, you were terrified that you'd get set on fire.

Raven would love to still spank you, but he's afraid if he spanks you while candlewax is dripping on your tits, you'll push forward and the candle might fall down and set the hotel room's floor on fire.

Martyr hasn't had enough of a chance to jizz on your face, so while he's tilting a candle dripping over your chest, his hand is cranking up and down his shaft, he's holding his penis to your face.

Precum drips out of his slit and onto your face, and you'd love to suck on his cock right now.

He then moved that candle to your other breast, where he tilted the candle and wax dripped on your tit, sliding down your breast.

You could've used a regular candle, not one you buy from a sex shop, but at least the candlewax won't be painful.

Drops of wax began to fall onto your breast, feeling hot and warm.

Kaz and Havok want turns to pour candlewax on your tits, so does Raven, probably.

Speaking of Raven, he's been behind you all this time sucking on your skin and biting it.

You're moaning for him as well as Martyr, your moans breathy while your eyes roll to the top of your head.

However, you can't touch Raven since your hands are up in the air.

Raven sees that candlewax is pouring on your tits, and he can't wait to rub and caress the candlewax on your breasts.

Havok grabbed the candle, taking it from Martyr who let go of it, and tilted it over one of your tits, where candlewax began to drip off of the candle and onto one of your breasts.

Havok wants to have his cock sucked, so does Kaz, and Kaz, Havok and Martyr all want to spank your ass and finger your clit.

Raven's gonna get his cock sucked when this little gangbang is over.

Would Raven like to pour candlewax on your tit? Maybe.

Havok eventually moved the candle to your other breast, tilting the candle while wax drips off of it and onto your breast.

Candlewax splattered on both of your breasts, covering them in wax.

Havok eventually handed the candle to Kaz, who continued tilting the candle while wax fell off of it and onto your breast.

Kaz was watching carefully while wax spilled onto your breast.

Raven is making your clit tingle and tickle, you're probably gonna cum pretty soon.

Kaz then moved the candle over to your other breast, still tilting that candle so wax will drip onto it.

The candle is running down almost to a nub, hopefully he won't burn his hand.

Candlewax did fall off of the candle and on your breast, like precum did previously.

Kaz then turned the candle upwards and straight and blew it out, and as Raven observed your breasts smothered in candlewax despite that he hasn't gotten a turn yet, he slid his hand away from in between your thighs.

However, before he could caress your tits, he wrapped his fingers around his erection and directed his penis to your twat.

The tip of his penis penetrated your pussy hole, and pretty soon, his cock entered you deeper and deeper, spreading your pussy walls out.

His fingers unwrapped from his shaft while his dick entered your pussy, only to lift his hands and place them on your breasts this time.

While his cock slid into your cunt, he began to squeeze your tits as well as caress your breasts covered in candle wax, his hands and palms smearing the wax into your skin.

He began to thrust and pound his cock in your pussy, and you began to bounce and ride up and down his dick.

He tried to rub the candlewax into your tits like precum previously as you rode him.

Did it work? Somewhat.

As you rode him, he let go of a part of your skin and bit another small portion of the skin on your neck, proceeding to suck your skin and give you a hickey.

He left a pinkish colored hickey that probably will fade away pretty soon, you can see his bite marks engraved in your neck.

You moaned while Raven fucked you, biting your bottom lip as he bit your skin.

He wanted to give you so many hickeys.

You haven't gotten a chance to suck on other cocks, so you turned your head to Havok's penis, where he pulled and inserted his dick into your mouth.

You started sucking his precum drenched cock, your mouth going up his shaft while you sucked it, swallowing his precum that trickled down his penis.

You'd rather have Martyr's dick in your mouth, but Havok and Kaz need turns as well.

Kaz, on the other hand, pointed his dick at your face, his hand still jacking his penis off and precum splattering on your face and down his shaft.

You're moaning while you have Havok's cock stuffed your mouth, buzzing around his shaft.

Martyr was the first one to cum, leaning his head back and groaning long as he jizzed, his slit releasing his seed on your face.

Thankfully, your eyes were closed and you won't get it in your eyes.

His slit spit out his cum running down his shaft and some of it got on your face, his jizz white and milky.

Raven growled while he bit your skin, and he proceeded to let go of your skin and bite other parts of your neck and suck them.

You can feel his breath on your skin while you ride him.

Since Raven hasn't had a chance to do this, his fingers tweaked and turned your nipples while you rode him.

He's taking you higher with your orgasm while he fucks you with his massive Jewish cock.

You want to moan his name and cry out, but you can't.

Your arms feel tired from having them up in the air for so long, and Kaz and Havok's wrists and hands (and probably their arms) must feel sore from holding you up so long.

Havok's had enough time having his cock sucked, so you turned your head to Kaz's penis and started sucking on his dick this time, his cock entering your mouth and swallowing his precum.

Martyr just jizzed not too long ago and you wanna suck his dick right now, but Kaz needs a turn.

Eventually, Kaz was the second person to cum, he jizzed inside your mouth, where you swallowed all of his cum leaking out of his slit and down his shaft.

Kaz groaned and bit his bottom lip when he came, shutting his eyes tight.

When you didn't taste anymore cum on his dick, you turned your head to Martyr, sucking on his cock.

Raven was the next one to jizz, groaning while he climaxed, biting on your skin hard, filling your twat up with his seed.

The last one to cum was Havok, who came on your face.

Actually, you were the last one to cum, and you creamed all over Raven's cock inside your pussy, your clitoris pounding after you came.

There was so much build up in your orgasm, you felt like you were gonna explode in your clitoris.

When they as well as you had all came, Raven moved his hands to your hips and pulled you off of his lap, his penis escaping out of your twat.

You sucked on Martyr's penis, cleaning it off with your mouth, swallowing his jizz.

You sucked off Raven, Havok and Kaz's dicks in that order, cleaning their penises and swallowing their cum.

After their dicks were all cleaned, Kaz, Havok and Martyr in that order all got turns to spank your ass with that paddle as well as bite and suck your neck, giving you hickeys all over your neck.

Vince Russo, one of the writers of TNA, probably would love an idea where you're being Serotonin's sex toy with your hands tied up while Raven's spanking you, rubbing your tits in candlewax while you have the other members of Serotonin's jizz on your face and tits, they all get turns to paddle your ass and eat your pussy and fuck you and they get their cocks all sucked.

#serotonin #tna #raven #michael shane #frank kazarian #johnny devine #martyr #kaz #havok #2000s #00s #fanfiction

[bookerandy]

kaysanova - they adopt some kids after realizing they’ve lost their immortality/one of them gets injured and doesn’t heal

I’m so sorry this took so long! I was going to add more, but haven’t had the time these past few days and decided to just add this part. Thank you for being patient and for sending this prompt! I had a lot of fun writing it.

If I end up writing more, I’ll reblog this and add to it! Also wtf you can’t add read more?? On the app???

-

Thankfully, it hadn’t been a big wound. It had only needed two stiches and Nile had taught herself how to treat their wounds when it happened to Andy. But it wasn’t really the wound that hurt and Nicky knew that.

They had never been without each other. Not even in the beginning, when they had killed each other over and over again. They had always had each other. It had always been the two of them against the world. Not anymore.

Nicky sat on the edge of the bathtub. Nile had crouched in front of him, as she cleaned the healing wound. She talked, but Nicky didn’t listen. It was one of the few times he didn’t listen. He adored her, it was almost like having his baby sister back.

They hadn’t talked about it, even though it had been months now. Nicky knew why, but he wanted to talk about it.

“And then Andy took me to the church downtown”, Nile continued, dabbing the wound with some antibiotics. “Have you been? It was really nice, actually. She even let me pray and-...”

The bathroom door opened. Joe stood there, casually leaning against the doorframe. He had a small smile on his lips.

“Would you give us a moment, Nile? Andy’s trying to cook, you might want to give her a hand.”

Nile glanced up at Nicky as if to ask him if it was alright, and Nicky nodded. He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“Don’t move, I still need to add a plaster.”

Nile passed Joe and Joe closed the door behind her. For just a moment, Joe stood by the door and Nicky sat on the edge of the tub and they didn’t even look at each other.

“I’m sorry”, Joe said, finally. “I’ve ignored it, I’ve ignored you and I’m sorry.”

Nicky stood. He gently took both of Joe’s hands in his own and held them. He searched for something to say, but in every language he knew there was nothing he could say that would make this hurt any less.

“I love you”, he said, instead. “And I don’t want you to hurt when I’m gone.”

Joe embraced him in a hug and they stood there for a long time. Nicky wasn’t sure how long, but it did make him feel better.

“I’ve been thinking”, Joe pulled back enough to have a look at him. “Do you remember what you said, that first night?”

“I don’t think I understand, Joe…”

Joe led him back to the tub and sat down. Nicky did the same. Joe grabbed his hand as soon as he did and pulled out his phone. He only held it, though.

“The first night we spent together. We talked about our families and you told me about the girl you’d marry. Do you remember?”

Nicky pulled his hand away.

“I am not leaving you!”

Joe was quick to grab his hand again and Joe’s soft fingers calmed his raging heart, if only a little.

“I don’t expect you to. Listen to me, please”, Joe spoke Italian now. Despite the 1000 years that had passed, he still spoke with a slight accent. It was barely audioble, but it was Joe. It was his Joe.

“You told me you didn’t want to marry her”, Joe continued, still in Italian. Nicky suspected it was to make sure Nile didn’t understand if she stood just outside the door, and to make Nicky feel a little more at home. It worked. “You told me the only thing you’d want from that marriage was children. Do you remember?”

Nicky’s heart beat so hard in his chest now that it physically hurt. They had agreed years ago that it wasn’t going to work with children. Even before Booker, they had both decided they didn’t want to outlive their children. Hell, they hadn’t even adopted a puppy for the same reason and that often happened to normal people.

“I’ve been in contact with a social worker”, Joe said, as Nicky slowly sat down next to him again. “And she has a little girl we could have. She only wants to meet you, that’s all.”

“Joe…”

“I mean it, Nicky. I want this and I know you want this.”

Nicky thought for a second and squeezed Joe’s hand.

“Okay.”

The office was brightly lit and had a bunch of kids’ drawings on the walls. It smelled faintly of the flowers in a bouquet by the window. The walls were yellow and the furniture was white. Scattered on the floor, there were toys and stuffed animals.

“You must be Joe”, the woman by the desk stood and held out her hand. “We spoke on the phone.”

Nicky watched as Joe took her hand. She was elderly and had a very kind face. Her hair was pulled up in a neat hairdo.

“And this must be Nicky”, the woman said, when she turned to shake Nicky’s hand. “I’m Rose. I’ve heard you’re interested in getting a little girl?”

Nicky nodded with a bright smile on his lips. He felt silly, but he hadn’t been this happy for a very long time. Since Andy lost her immortality, it had been difficult to find something to keep them going.

“We have a three year old here. Her name is Ava and she is born here in the States. Would you like to sit?”

Nicky and Joe sat by her desk. She offered them coffee and talked to them, asking questions and telling them about Ava. Nicky was about to burst, when she finally asked when they wanted to see her. The woman left the room and Nicky turned to Joe. Joe looked just as happy as Nicky felt.

“I can’t believe we’re going to meet her”, Nicky took Joe’s hand, holding it for a moment.

The woman returned just a few minutes later, with the little girl resting on her hip. Ava had black, kinky hair and big, chestnut eyes. She wore a bright pink dress and a pair of white shoes. She also held a stuffed pony almost as big as herself. She was perfect.

Nicky quickly stood when Rose walked inside the room and let the little girl down on the floor. She held the pony close to her chest and looked up at Nicky with wide eyes. He crouched next to her and waved his hand, just a little.

“Hello, there”, he said, gently. “I’m Nicky.”

“I’m Ava”, the girl said and held out the pony. “This is Pinky.”

Nicky petted the pony and smiled. Joe joined him on the floor and greeted the girl.

“Should we play?” Nicky sat down and picked up one of the stuffed toys.

They played. Nicky wasn’t sure how long they stayed, but he had a warm and fuzzy feeling in his chest. Ava stood with Rose and waved them off when it was time to leave.

They returned two weeks later and signed all the papers. Ava got to come home with them and she was only the first of many.

“You’re gonna get to meet your aunties now”, Nicky told Ava, as Joe unlocked the door to the safe house. They walked inside and even before the door closed behind them, Nile came running.

“Look at her!” She said and she beamed. “Hello, Ava!”

Ava shyly his her face against Nicky’s shoulder and he laughed gently, petting her back.

“This is Nile”, he told her, but let her hide. “She’s your aunt.”

Slowly, Ava turned back to have a look at Nile. Nile looked as if Christmas had come early.

“Andy is in the kitchen. She’s making dinner.”

Joe gently took Ava from Nicky’s arms, as Nicky undressed. They had gotten her gifts to open as soon as they had eaten and Andy had promised to make her favourite (even though no one but Andy knew what that was) and Nile had made baklava the day before. Even Booker had sent Ava a gift. Nile and Andy kept in contact with him, even though it was “cheating”.

Andy stood by the oven in the kitchen. She had a towel thrown over her shoulder and her hair had grown just below her ears. She had dressed up, because she “had to make a good impression.”

“Aunt Andy”, Joe called, and waved to the woman. Ava did the same, although still shyly. “Look at our daughter!”

When Andy turned around, her cheeks were flushed and she looked just as exciting as Nile, even though she clearly tried to hide it.

“Hi there”, Andy said, as she quickly threw the towel on the counter. She held out her hand, but changed her mind a second later and waved instead. “I’m Andy.”

“My name is Ava”, Ava said with a shy smile and struggled to get down on the floor. Joe let her down.

The table setting was all in pink and blue, except for a big wine glass in yellow plastic. Ava’s name was written in big, circular letters on the glass.

Ava waddled to her seat and Andy helped her up, but then quickly took a step back and sat on the other side of the table. Joe and Nicky quickly joined at the table and Nile came inside ten minutes later with a paper crown and placed it on Ava’s head.

“Welcome home, Ava!” Nile said, as she sat next to Andy. Andy served them all (turned out her favourite was pasta and sauce, even though Nicky didn’t actually believe that).

They ate and Ava slowly began talking and wasn’t as shy as she had when they first arrived. She giggled and ate enough food for a horse. Nicky’s heart hurt, that was just how adorable she was.

“Now”, Joe said, when they had all finished their seconds and thirds. “Ava has to open her gifts!”

Ava turned to him with big, bright eyes.

“I get gifts?” She asked. “Daddy, do I get gifts?”

Nicky laughed softly and nodded as a reply. Joe snuck up behind Ava and picked her up from the chair. She cheered, and they all joined Joe as he walked to the living room.

If there had been a tree and some more lights, it would have looked a lot like Christmas did when they celebrated together. Wrapped gifts littered the room and a banner spelled the words “welcome home!” Just above the television. Ava already sat in the middle of the gifts.

Nile pulled out her phone and snapped a picture and Andy didn’t even tell her off.

“Andy…” Nicky gently touched her shoulder. “We said a few. You’ll spoil her.”

Joe laughed and Nile sat next to Ava on the floor. Ava looked around the room in disbelief.

“Don’t worry, there’s one for you and Joe.”

When Nile gave Ava one of the presents, she quickly ripped the paper and held up a colouring book and pencils Nile had gotten. Nicky and Joe ended up together on the couch and Andy sat in the other corner. She watched Ava with an adoration Nicky hadn’t seen in the woman for decades.

Ava unwrapped another gift. She picked up the plastic sword in both hands and swung it around, as she let out a roar. Nile laughed softly violently she fell to the floor.

“Andy!” Joe complained, but he was quick to join his daughter on the floor. Ava hit Joe with the sword and he immediately dropped to the ground, moaning in pretend pain.

“I’m the princess!” Ava announced, even though the paper crown had slipped from her head. When she had hit both Nicky, Nile and Andy, too (and they had all “died”) Ava returned to the pile of gifts for her.

She unwrapped gift after gift. Ballet shoes. More colouring books. Dolls. Stuffed animals. A tutu (which she quickly pulled on and then hit everyone with the sword again). Enough dresses to dress an army of Girl Scouts.

When there was only one gift left, Ava curled up on the couch with Andy and held it out for her, as if to ask Andy to unwrap it for her. Nicky’s heart melted and he could see just how much it touched Andy. She unwrapped it, slowly, as if she was sure Ava would tear it from her hands again, but she didn’t. Andy pulled a plastic dinosaur from the paper. She held it out to Ava, who shook her head.

“You need a toy, too! We have to play together!”

Andy’s eyes got teary and she quickly pulled one last gift from behind her back. She held out it for Ava.

“It’s for papa and daddy. Would you give it to them?”

Ava nodded and turned to her parents and held out the gift as if it was the most valuable thing she had ever held in her little hands.

“You unwrap it, love”, Nicky said, as he wrapped both arms around Joe. Joe took the gift and unwrapped it. When Nicky saw it, he actually began crying.

Joe held a camera in his hands.

“Don’t cry, daddy!” Ava jumped down from the couch and hugged Nicky and he picked her up from the floor and hugged her right back. Her small body felt perfect against his, as if she was meant to be there. And Nicky knew that she was. She was supposed to be theirs. It was destiny, just like it had been destiny that Joe and Nicky had met.

“Andromache”, Joe’s voice was muffled and broke towards the end of her name. “Thank you.”

Nile flopped down between Joe and Andy, pouting.

“Don’t leave me out. I wanna be mushy and cry, too.”

There was an album, too. Even though there were only two pictures in it, so far, it was beautiful. The first picture was of Ava when she was born (Andy wouldn’t tell how she had gotten it) and the second was Ava’s picture from the adoption site. Nile took a few pictures of the room and then way too many pictures of them all together.

Ava became their little gemstone. She was awfully spoiled and got her first, real sword when she turned thirteen. She wasn’t allowed anywhere near missions, but she trained with her aunties as often as she was allowed.

#the old guard #tog #long post #immortal husbands #fanfiction

[something-in-the-seas]

November 18th, 1968 (Part 1)

I thought I would share the Aftershock one shots. They’re on AO3 as well here. There is centered on the Bioshock 2 cast coming to the surface, basically it’s a long ass night and everyone is suffering. Our lord and savior Booker isn’t here yet but Ryan is suffering. 

I thank @frangstfontaine for inspiring me to finish this last night after those riveting Area 51 discussions 

TW: For pregnancy (Liz is pregnant with Ziggy). 

7:15 PM

The beginning of the holiday season had always been Jack’s favorite time of year. From what little he could remember during his time in Rapture, trapped in Fontaine’s laboratories and stuck under the eye of Suchong, besides New Years, everything else was heavily frowned upon. There were no organized religions in Rapture, so no Christmas or Hanukkah, unless you celebrated it in your own home. From what he could gather, Rapture’s founding, November 5th, was supposed to act as a stand in for the more commercial aspects of Christmas.

And Thanksgiving?

“Being thankful for what you have is for parasites! Propaganda made up by the hacks in Washington! Tell me, why do I have to thank any of you? For my accomplishments? No, I did that on my own, no invisible man in the sky helped me. For the displeasure you’ve all caused me for the past ten years? If so, yes, thank you-”

Well, Andrew Ryan made it very clear what his thoughts on Thanksgiving were, and he made sure everyone knew it every year during the big feast. Whether you wanted his opinion or not, you were going to get it. This Thanksgiving was going to be no exception.

So, he never got to celebrate the holidays as a child. The most he got was a piece of candy from Tenenbaum that he cherished. But, there were other memories jumbled in: of times when he was small, chewing on a turkey leg, saying grace with a family so large that the table could fit nearly a dozen people. He could vividly remember sitting on his father’s shoulders to put the star on the tree they picked together outside their farm in Kansas. He and his mother used to spend a day building an army of snowmen, and then spend the night snuggled by the fire with a cup of hot chocolate, listening to the Christmas radio dramas.

But, those weren’t real. The loving and gentle mother and father he remembered from events that never even happened had never existed. His whole life was a lie. At first, it was a lot to take in, and he had a hard time accepting it.

Getting able to recreate those moments with his children, though, made up more than enough. Their first Christmas, he barely had anything, but the joy on their faces when they saw the few presents he could afford under their tiny, dying tree in their uncomfortably small apartment somehow made it the most magical one of all.

He didn’t have a farm in Kansas, but he managed to work hard enough to afford a large, spacious house in a nice suburb right outside of town. He had that big table in their big dining room that perfectly fit a big, happy (for the most part) family for Thanksgiving.  Every Christmas marked more presents under their huge, ornament full tree, the stockings hanging on the fireplace practically being dragged down by how full they were. And even though Masha chose to celebrate Hanukkah, which they all celebrated together, she also did very well for herself when it came to gifts.

If he had the means, he was going to spoil his girls rotten. After everything they had gone through during the first few years of their lives, they deserved the world.

But, the material things weren’t why he loved the holidays. It was nice to give or receive a gift, the decorations in town were always beautiful, and keeping the dream of Santa Claus alive as long as humanly possible was special, of course. He used to say the holidays were his favorite because of how excited his girls would get when the time rolled in. How he was able to start new traditions with them like playing out in the snow or decorating the house as a family.  

Every year, more picture frames were added on the fireplace. What started as one lonely photo of them all standing at the steps of the lighthouse, squinting from the intensity of the sun and exhausted, turned into school portraits, memorabilia from family vacations, graduation pictures, it went on and on.

As Jack finished placing the garland on the fireplace, his eyes moved to one frame in particular; a photo of a stunning, beaming young woman with light brown hair, pointing at a letter she held out by the kitchen table. ‘Berkeley bound!’ was written on the white, wooden frame with purple paint.

Janice, his eldest, who used to be a gangly, awkward girl in a torn, dirty pink dress that didn't even go to her knees, was twenty-one now. She was on her second year at Berkeley Law. She earned it. She studied for weeks, stayed up multiple nights to achieve it, even when people doubted her, she never gave up, but still, he missed her. California was so far away from New York.

And Rosie, his not-so-little spitfire, was an hour away in NYU. Freshmen weren’t allowed to bring their cars onto campus, and if she ever wanted to come home for the weekends, he would have been at the train station to pick her up in a heartbeat. She just chose to stay in the city. The Big Apple was much more exciting than little, old Saratoga Falls. She had always been attracted to the bustle of the city and was happy living the nightlife with her friends. It must have been nostalgic for her.

With his girls all grown up and beginning to go their own ways, the holidays now meant something else to Jack. It brought them all home. He got to know them, not just as their father, but as their friend. He’d learn all about Masha’s family as they celebrated Hanukkah, Janice would tell about her time in California and everything going on at college, Rosie always had some crazy stories to share, and the younger girls ranted to him about their classes.

“Janice called.”

Jack turned his head to see his wife leaning on the doorway, a soft smile on her lips. She must have been watching decorate for a while.

“Do you know where she’s at?” he asked. He couldn’t have contained his excitement even if he tried.  

“When we talked, she had just picked up Rosie at the station and they were stopping to get gas and some drinks.” She walked towards him and wrapped her thin arms around his thick, muscular waist. “She said she needed caffeine and had to save her quarters for the vending machine, so she couldn't stay on for long.”

“I told her if she was too tired from the flight I would have picked her up at the airport,” Jack replied. “I don’t like any of the girls driving on Hamilton at night, you know how bad deer season is right now?”

She rolled her eyes with a smirk. “They’ll be fine, Rosie’s got enough energy in her to power a small army.”

“Liz, I had five cars coming into the shop from deer accidents this week alone. Completely totaled! I don’t even know what to do with them.”

“You know how careful Janice is, she moves at a snail's pace when there’s an inch of snow. They’ll be home, perfectly safe in a half an hour.” Elizabeth paused. “Ten minutes if Rosie gets pissed enough to take the wheel.”

He shook his head. “God help us.” He took her hands and rubbed his calloused fingers over her smooth skin. “So, who is this guy Janice is bringing over? Dennis?”

“David,” she corrected, playfully scolding him. “And from everything I’ve heard about him, he is a very nice guy, and he makes her very happy. Oh, and he’s in medical school.”

It was as if she was warning him, and Jack sighed, running a hand through his dirty blonde hair. “I’m sure he’s a good kid. She’s just so young. She’s only twenty-one!”

“I was twenty-one when I met you,” Elizabeth replied. “Besides, you were-”

“No, don’t even go there.”

And now he was playfully scolding her, and they both chuckled together before they found their wedding picture on the mantle. They stood outside the church, arm in arm, with their girls, who were much younger than they were now and wearing matching little dresses, with several good friends such as Dr. Tenenbaum.

There was a guilty pang in his stomach when he saw her in the back, looking awkward and like she didn’t belong. He could tell Elizabeth felt the same way, especially with how things were for the past month or so. It was a looming elephant in the room that had to be addressed soon, but they wanted to ignore it for just a little while longer.

He had to say, though, he looked quite dashing in his tux and Liz, of course, was gorgeous in that dress, but he was biased. His wife was the most beautiful woman alive.

And then, there was a more recent photo beside it of he and Sally, beaming from ear to ear after one of her cheerleading competitions last spring. It was closer to the city, and when it was over, they got ice cream. She wasn’t that cowering seven-year-old in the bathysphere anymore. Today was her birthday, and she was sixteen now.

“I miss when they were that small,” Jack said, his full of melancholy as Elizabeth rested her head on one of his broad shoulders. “It’s like they don’t even need us anymore.”

“They still need us.”

“Yeah, but they’re not coming to us anymore if they got a scrape or had a nightmare, or asking me to read them a bedtime story-”

“Isn’t this what we wanted, though?” Elizabeth asked. “Them to grow up and be normal, independent women with their own lives?”

“I just didn’t realize how fast it was going to go.” He faced his wife. “I miss when they’d run around the house and play dolls right here. Or, when they’d sit at the table and paint. I mean, what’s the point of having this big house if it’s empty?”

She smiled softly, leading his hands to the growing swell of her stomach, just beginning to poke out from her dress. “Just think, we’ll get to do it all over again soon.”

And the thought of reliving all those moments again and passing down those holiday traditions with someone entirely new- a little boy or girl who would be the perfect blend of them both- gave Jack chills. Good chills, but chills nonetheless. They both had dreamed about this, tried for years. There were so many tears shed. Doctors had told them to give up, that it just wasn’t possible, and they were ready to, but here they were now. Cradling their unborn child, who’s birth in just a few short months would mark the beginning of spring, and with it, a whole new chapter of their lives.

He may have been excited for this Christmas, but he was already looking forward to next year.

As he cupped his wife’s cheeks, Jack could only be amazed that she was somehow even more beautiful carrying their child than ever before. God, he loved her. He loved his family so much. Rapture and Fontaine may have tried to take everything from him, but they gave him even more than he thought was possible.

Their lips inched closer together, ready to share a passionate kiss, but their moment together was disrupted by the shuffling of feet. A small cough from near the doorway made them separate. Their youngest girl, fifteen-year-old Leta, glanced between the two as she rubbed her arm. Her cheeks were turning a light shade of pink.

“Grandpa wants to know if we’re doing cake soon,” she began after she was finished gawking. “He says that his show is coming on, and he does not want to be bothered while he’s watching it.”

The couple raised a brow at each other and scowled. “Did you tell him it’s up to your sister?” He asked.

“Well, yeah, but he told me that her birthday doesn’t give her superiority over him.” The bespectacled girl shrugged. "I didn't want to get into a debate with him."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes while Jack exhaled slowly. He placed a hand on his daughter’s shoulders. “Alright,” he said as father and daughter began to make their way to the kitchen, “let’s take care of the old man.”

“I’m going to see what Sal wants to do.” Elizabeth motioned upstairs. “It’s her day, she’s the birthday girl.”

Jack nodded, though, he felt a pang a jealousy that his wife didn’t have to deal with his father. Stress wasn’t good for the baby, and Andrew Ryan had the magical gift of raising blood pressures. He didn’t even need to open his mouth to do it, Jack could feel the inevitable migraine starting and there weren’t any arguments yet.

Yet.

#aftershock #bioshock #bioshock 2 #jack wynand #jack ryan #andrew ryan #elizabeth comstock #sally ryan #janice ryan #rosie ryan #leta ryan #masha lutz #masha ryan #brigid tenenbaum #david smith #pregnancy// #1968

[shiroe-is-my-baby]

Domestic asks for Lee and Booker and Asuna please!

Lee

What kind of movies do you watch with your f/o?

Usually something fantasy or adventure! Maybe a little action if we’re feeling particularly excited about those, but I’m not a huge action person myself. Anything with a good story we just love!

Who sleeps in and who cooks breakfast?

I sleep in and Lee cooks breakfast! Sometimes I’ll get up early enough to cook it with him, but it’s hard because I’m not a morning person at all.

Who is the pickier eater?

Neither of us are really all that picky! I can be at times, though.

Do you two/three/etc fight over the thermostat?

YES. Lee doesn’t like it cold, but me, I love it a but cooler. I can’t take it if it’s too warm, and I get hot kinda easily and I’m miserable and that’s not good for him. So eventually he just lets me have it XD

How do you spend rainy days together?

Usually cuddled up by the fire with some music playing as we talk about our day. With soft kisses lingering on each other’s skin and its just warm and inviting and perfect.

Who is likelier to mess up the laundry and turn all of the white clothes pink?

MEEEE. Don’t ever let me do laundry, ever. I’m such a klutz. Lee’s good shirts are all ruined and I’m almost in tears I’m so upset. Expect him to kiss my cheek and tell me that it’s alright with a laugh.

How do you + your f/o(s) deal with appliances that need fixing?

Lee will try to fix them on his own, and you can’t expect me to help because I don’t know shit. But most of the time we end up calling someone to fix it, because we just can’t do it all the way.

Do you argue over interior decoration choices?

Not really! Neither of us are too picky as long as it looks nice and we both have input in small things. As long as it feels like home we don’t really mind how it’s decorated!

Who takes more pictures?

I do. I just love getting picturing of us together or him alone because he’s so handsome. Lee will sometimes take them of me when he thinks about it, but it’s not all that often.

Who steals the covers?

MEEEEE. Lee learned very early on not to fight me XD He will not win aha

Booker

What kind of movies do you watch with your f/o?

Usually action movies. Booker enjoys action movies, and I don’t mind watching them with him. Sometimes we’ll watch classics, too, though!

Who sleeps in and who cooks breakfast?

We both get up and I make breakfast for him before he goes to work. I had gotten used it it early on, becaues I want to cook for him and see him off and just ahve that moment with him.

Who is the pickier eater?

Booker will eat just about anything, so probably me XD

Do you two/three/etc fight over the thermostat?

Oh yes. Booker doesn’t like it a certain temp or too cool. At all. He’ll fight me and find ways to keep me from it, just knowing that I’ll mess with it and since he knows my patterns its very easy and I pout so bad.

How do you spend rainy days together?

Cuddling and eating leftovers in each others arms while watching a good movie, most likely. Or in bed taking a nap. This is all given that he’s not working, but yes, we’ll most likely be napping in each others arms.

Who is likelier to mess up the laundry and turn all of the white clothes pink?

Me again! That’s why Booker ends up doing the laundry. He can’t have his good shirts being messed up, and I feel bad because I want to help him. But he’ll insist that it’s fine.

How do you + your f/o(s) deal with appliances that need fixing?

Booker usually will go at it for a few hours, insisting over and over again that he can fix it. Sometimes he does! Sometimes it’s uh not gonna happen but he still inists because my wonderful husband is stubborn.

Do you argue over interior decoration choices?

Not really. Booker doesn’t care, and he lets me have completely control over decorating. He’ll help if I ask, but he’ll continue to tell me that it’s completely my choice and as long as I’m happy he’s happy.

Who takes more pictures?

Meeeee. Booker isn’t a fan of pictures, but he can’t turn me down when I’m snapping them all the time and just wanting to have pictures of us. He loves taking pictures of me, though. He has many pictures of me on his desk, in his wallet, just everywhere. A couple, his favorite, being our picture we took on our wedding day that he can’t go a day without looking at.

Who steals the covers?

MEEEE. Booker, though, he’ll fight me right back and I can’t fight that man XD

Asuna

What kind of movies do you watch with your f/o?

Oh, all kinds! Romance, fantasy, adventure. Just any movie that looks interesting to us we’re gonna watch! We love movies, sometimes we’ll watch Disney movies too.

Who sleeps in and who cooks breakfast?

I sleep in and Asuna makes breakfast. I love her so much, she spoils me way too much. She sometimes even brings it to bed with me when I don’t wake up. God I’m so lukcy to have her, what did I do…

Who is the pickier eater?

Me, but I can’t be picky with Asuna, okay. I just can’t. She will not let me, plus her food is too good anyway.

Do you two/three/etc fight over the thermostat?

Not really, we both like it kind of the same. So there’s no arguing! ^.^

How do you spend rainy days together?

Cuddling up in bed playing video games! We love it, it’s our best tme to relax and have fun together. Get a little competitive, sometimes go out to the window and watch the rain outside.

Who is likelier to mess up the laundry and turn all of the white clothes pink?

Okay, let’s not even say it, we already kknow. Asuna does the laundry anyway, and I’m doing other chores XD

How do you + your f/o(s) deal with appliances that need fixing?

We call someone. Neither of us are very handy, and we know better than to try because we know we’ll just mess it up.

Do you argue over interior decoration choices?

Sometimes, but only because we both have our own ideas. I love decorating the house with her, though. It was one of the things I was looking forward to when we moved in together! Asuna has the better ideas, though, so I can’t argue much! Plus, I want to spoil the shit out of my queen, sooo

Who takes more pictures?

We both LOVE pictures man. We take pictures daily of each other and send them to one another when we’re away. Asuna kills me with her selfies, I’m not even freaking kidding. I’ll be working or busy and she’ll send me one with a little miss you baby or something and I’m speechless. She’s so gorgeous man. My wife, god.

Who steals the covers?

We both do. It’s a fight every night XD We usually have a ton of blankets though, so you’d think that’d limit the times that we fight. But it… doesn’t…

#the queen answers #queensmare #otp: ashuna #otp: love in the wrong time #otp: pearls and shotgun shells #<333333

[writingwhilecaffeinated]

Chapter 2 of my Eurovision AU cause apparently this is who I am now...

“You’re staring, Joe.”

Joe was startled out of his reverie by Booker and Nile, both of whom were smirking at him.

“What? No, I wasn’t-”

“Staring at the very attractive Italian singer?” Booker teased.

Joe turned back to the stage where Nicky seemed to be adamantly refusing the addition of drably clothed acrobatic dancers to his act. Booker gave a low whistle when he saw the short haired woman at his side, leveling a glare at the stage manager.

“Andromache is his manager, huh?”

Nile and Joe raised inquisitive eyebrows in Booker’s direction.

“Andromache, well, Andy. She’s one of the best in the business, she’s extremely loyal to her artists. She managed in Greece before moving on up to Italy.”

Joe nodded vaguely before turning his full attention back to Nicky, who seemed to have won his battle, as Nicky held his microphone to his lips. The music started, a ballad, and Nicky opened his mouth and began to sing. His voice was unique, gruff but somehow...calm, and melancholy. He could see how Nicky was known primarily as a rock singer in his home country.

Nile nudged Joe’s ribs. Joe didn’t look at her but simply nodded. Nile was attuned to Joe enough to know she could speak.

“What’s up Joe? You look… puzzled.”

“Nicky’s song.”

“Oh, on nickname terms with him already, are you?”

Joe ignored her comment.

“He’s beautiful… I mean, his voice is beautiful...I mean, he and his voice are beautiful. But something is missing.”

Nile turned and also listened to Nicky sing. She couldn’t understand much since Nicky’s song was in Italian (she had been told that Italy always submitted songs in Italian instead of English like many of the other countries) but she knew what love songs sounded like. The song itself, she could tell, was quite good. But the more she listened the more she just wasn’t convinced.

“Hmmmm,” Nile pondered, glancing a sly look up at Joe as he stood transfixed. “Let’s hope the man can find what he’s missing before the Final, no?”

Nicky was breathing hard as he exited his rehearsal. It had been better than expected, once he had fought off the idea of having backup dancers of any kind. He didn’t want any distractions on stage, both for the audience but also for himself. It was hard enough singing the song as it was and it didn’t need to be harder. Plus, Nicky thought as he used his long legs to propel him backstage, he was hoping he could catch Joe before he left the stadium.

Nicky saw he was in luck, Joe was just outside the backstage area in the hallway where the dressing rooms were. Joe was talking to a young, beautiful black woman and a handsome, roguish middle aged man. He had the manager look about him, Nicky observed. He just had that vibe.

Nicky forced himself to speak before he lost his nerve.

“Joe!”

Joe looked up and his face broke into that wide, radiant smile that did funny things to Nicky’s stomach. Was it possible that you could die of happiness and embarrassment at the same time due to someone’s smile? To think you were filled to the brim with joy and the need to throw up at the same time? Nicky was anxiously thrilled with the thought of it.

“Nicky,” Joe said, breaking the ranks of his trio to meet Nicky in the middle of the hallway. “I hope you don’t mind. I heard your act. You have a wonderful voice.”

Nicky, for what felt like the millionth time that day, flushed.

“Oh. Oh no you don’t need to be kind. You were much better. Listen,” Nicky had to get this out before he lost his nerve. “I was thinking, would you...that is - uh…”

Joe was still smiling at him, encouragingly but it was only making Nicky lose all train of thought faster than ever before. Dear lord it was like he was a busker all over again, paralyzed by fear as he tried to get tips by passersby on the streets in Roma.

“What he’s trying to say is would you be willing to join us for a party tonight,” said a voice and suddenly Quynh was at his side, smiling and affable. “I’m Quynh,” she said, sticking out her pale hand, her long fingers wiggling in invitation. “Nicky’s makeup artist.”

Joe took Quynh’s hand in his own and shook it firmly.

“Oh, very nice,” Quynh remarked, studying Joe’s hand before letting it go. “You don’t shake like I’m gonna break. I quite like you!”

“Quynh, calm down, he hasn’t said he’ll accompany us yet,” Andy said, appearing out of thin air on Nicky’s other side. “Hey, I have a feeling you know who I am if Booker’s had any say in it.”

“Oh you know I did, Andy,” Booker said, saddling up with Nile to flank Joe. Booker walks forward and gives Andy a hug and both Joe and Nicky realize that the two must have a longer history together than either has let on. “Now what’s this about a party?”

“Oh you know, the usual schmooze and booze before the semi-finals start. Lots of countries will be there, particularly the Western bloc and the coastal countries. You should join, it’d be good for your boy, Joe, here.”

Nicky felt like the conversation had been ripped out from under him and taken on new life between the two managers. This was not how he had imagined this conversation going. At all.

“Well, we should definitely go then. Joe’s performing in the second round of Semi-Finals so if he gets smashed, won’t be too much of an issue.”

Suddenly Andy and Booker were walking off, talking about the other countries, what the odd-makers were predicting, and oddly the newest editions to their liquor cabinets at home. Quynh sighed, an exasperated grin gracing her face.

“Don’t mind them, those two go way back. And god when you get managers in the same room together,” at this she rolled her eyes. “It’s almost insufferable. Luckily Andy has me to keep things fun!”

With that Quynh proceeded to glide after them, playfully throwing sarcastic comments over Booker and Andy’s conversation like well-placed confetti.

“Um,” Nile said, turning her head towards Joe and Nicky. The two men had gone back to staring at each other. “Well, I would introduce myself but I don’t think you would even register the words I’m saying. Nicky, pick Joe up at 7pm. He’ll give you the hotel address. Make sure he gets back safely. I will be getting smashed with those three. Joe, don’t wait up. I have a feeling I won’t be coming back to the room tonight.”

With that Nile gave Nicky a wink and punched Joe playfully in his bicep before prancing off the same way the others had left.

“What… just happened?” Nicky asked, utterly bewildered by how that entire conversation went down.

“I’m not exactly sure, but I think you were in the middle of asking me out?” Joe wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and Nicky couldn’t help but chortle.

“I mean-”

“Well, go ahead.”

“What?”

“Ask me out.”

Nicky met Joe’s eyes once again and, miraculously, saw Joe’s answer before he even asked him. Nicky’s heart swelled as his chest tightened, creating the most delightful bloom of pain in his chest.

“Joe, will you go with me to the party tonight? As my date?”

“Why Nicky,” Joe murmured, stepping closer so his lips were brushing the shell of Nicky’s ear. “I would be delighted.”

“Get a room already!

“Don’t ruin, the moment Nile!”

But the moment was made better as Joe and Nicky’s effervescent laughter filled the hall.

Nicky fidgeted with his earring as he knocked on Joe's hotel door. Should he have taken it out? Was it too much? Did it go with his black button down? Dear god, what was he doing? What was he wearing? He should go change… But before Nicky could run the door opened and Nicky was met with a vision.

Joe was in dress casual wear, what any pop singer might throw on to a party or a club. He was wearing the leather jacket of sin again, but this time coupled with a designer black t-shirt, a backward leopard print baseball cap, perfectly tailored, tight black trousers, designer sneakers, and an array of silver rings decorating his fingers.

“Fuck me,” Nicky breathed before realizing he said that out loud and frantically covered his mouth shut with a hand.

Joe threw back his head and laughed but it was not unkind. When he looked at Nicky again his shoulders were shaking, his tanned cheeks tinged pink from trying to hold the laughter in.

“I usually don’t get that until the end of the date,” Joe said, closing the door behind him and stepping forward. “But it can be arranged.”

———— Read the rest at Ao3

#immortal husbands #the old guard #joe x nicky #kaysonova #nicky x joe #tog

[lpdwillwrite4coffee]

BLOODY SUNRISE CHAPTER TEN

“C’mon now,” Booker laughed, holding his hands up. “Put your weight into it.”

Caitlin balled up her fists, keeping them at her chin like he taught her.

Booker tapped the center of his left palm. “Right there. C’mon, like ya mean it.”

She jabbed, knuckles making contact with his hand. It barely stung and he didn’t even flinch.

“Really, Meadows?”

She sighed and dropped her arms. “I’m trying.”

“No you’re not, you’re pussyfootin’,” he said, lowering his hands. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of hurtin’ me.”

She bit the tip of her tongue to keep quiet.

Every day for at least an hour Booker had been teaching her self-defense. He started with blocking and how to disarm someone, and then moved on to more offensive tactics—proper punching form, sparring, and how to escape certain holds.

She was getting better, but her punch needed some work.

“Maybe I’m just not annoyed with you enough,” she said, smirking and lifting an eyebrow.

“If our fight this mornin’ about the last of the peanut butter wasn’t enough to piss you off for a day, I dunno what is.”

She scowled at him. “I told you not to bring it up again.”

Booker grinned and held his hands up. “That’s it. G’head, throw that punch out.”

She jabbed and skin to skin snapped like a rubber band.

“There ya go, that’s it,” he said, voice low.

The deep rumble of words sent goosebumps up her arms, completely out of place in the Mississippi summer heat.

“C’mon, Cae,” he urged.

It was too similar to her dream.

The first time in over a month she didn’t have a nightmare or empty void of unconsciousness and it turned into… that.

“Hey, where’d ya go?” He asked, brow furrowing.

“Huh?”

“Disappearin’ in your head again.”

She blinked. “Sorry.”

Readjusting her stance, she gave a couple fierce punches, and tried to ignore the tiny thrill skipping through her as Booker grunted.

He was going to figure it out. He read her too well, always telling her she thought too loud.

Not that he was the Sphinx riddle to her either.

She knew. She saw the hints of pink high on his cheekbones and the tips of his ears when she moaned into a good stretch. How he’d practically snap his neck to avoid watching her clean off in a creek or pond. He’d give in eventually, and she knew the moment exactly—Her pulse would always quicken, and the hair would raise at the back of her neck. Like being watched by a wolf in the forest.

Not that she’d mind being devoured.

“What?”

Booker’s voice brought her back to the present so fast she could’ve gotten whiplash.

“Lost steam, Meadows,” he commented. “You need a break?”

She bit the inside of her lip.

She needed something else entirely.

“Yeah, sure.” Dropping her fists, she wandered over to the Jeep and sat on the bumper.

Sweat dripped down her neck from her hairline, and she wiped at it. She was perpetually damp from the heat and humidity, never able to fully cool off.

Glancing up, she caught Booker staring at where her hand was against her collarbone. Quickly he ducked and turned away, suddenly very interested in the tree they’d parked under.

Oh yeah, he was an open book.

Standing, she opened up the back and took a small amount of toilet paper off the roll they had at the ready.

“I’m gonna…” She trailed off, flashing the Charmin.

“Stay close,” he said, and she rolled her eyes.

Over protective, as always.

She’d just finished and was about to yank her underwear back up when she noticed.

“Shit.” It was louder than intended.

“Y’alright?”

“Uh… yeah.”

Boots crunched closer. “Meadows?”

She sighed and glared up at the branches over her head. “Can you toss me my pack?”

“Y’get bit by somethin’ or—”

“No, Booker, geez,” she snapped. “Just throw me my bag, please?”

He muttered something incomprehensible and strode away. The Jeep door opened and shut and then he was returning.

“Where you at?”

“No, don’t come over,” she called. “Just toss it…” She held her hand up so he knew where to aim.

Her pack landed a foot away and she snatched it up.

Booker was leaning against the Jeep when she returned, sipping on a water bottle.

“Somethin’ wrong?”

Shoving her pack behind the passenger seat, she shook her head. “Nope. You ready to head out?”

He looked like he was trying too hard not to grin. “Sure.”

They were on the road less than two minutes before he was cocking his head at her.

“Got your period, huh?”

Caitlin nearly choked on her Gatorade.

Booker laughed at her reaction, shifting his hold on the wheel—back to that alpha male wrist driving she hated so goddamn much.

“The fuck, Booker.”

“It’s not like you were subtle.”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Sure it is.”

“Excuse me?”

He laughed again. “I mean, in terms of a supply run. We gotta make sure you have what y’need.”

“I’m good. I have plenty.”

“Besides, I ain’t a caveman,” he said, eyeing her like he was waiting for her to counter that statement. “I understand biology.”

“Bully for you, you’re a 21st century man.” She pointedly stared out the window, wind tangling her hair.

There was a beat before he said, “Why’d you think ya had hide it?”

“I wasn’t—”

“You were.”

She sighed. “I don’t know, Booker, maybe I’m just not used to living with a man.”

He nodded, making an affirmative noise at the back of this throat. “Makes sense.” He glanced over at her, adding, “Y’mean, uh… Nathaniel ain’t the Tampax run in the middle of the night, kinda guy?”

Caitlin’s eyes widened. She hadn’t thought of Nathaniel in days.

“We never lived together.” She stared at Booker’s profile. “I’m sure he would’ve if I’d asked.”

“Usin’ past tense,” Booker commented. “That mean you think he’s gone?”

She considered it a moment. “It means… I don’t know where we stand if I do find him again.”

Everything in her screamed at the vulnerability of her statement. She’d left herself wide open for a barrage of questions that would all lead to the same conclusion.

Her feelings had shifted.

It wouldn’t take a genius to figure out the rest.

By the grace of a god she didn’t believe in, Booker only hummed and nodded in understanding.

                                                               ***

Since acquiring the Jeep, their routine had changed significantly. Off roading wasn’t much of an issue as long as the trees weren’t too thick. They made infinitely better time and now that they were further from Atlanta, odds of running across military goon squads were slim. Highways were still packed with abandoned cars, but Caitlin enjoyed the scavenging. It was something she was good at, and she had an eye for people’s patterns and habits, which meant she could always tell who had the better stuff.

She’d taken to collecting CDs along with essentials. It kept her sane, gathering such small tokens of optimism. Not to mention it was helpful in drowning out Booker’s bickering from time to time.

After several days of zig-zagging across Alabama and into Mississippi, they decided to make camp near a freshwater pond to rest and clean up.

Booker kept watch, just like always, as she rinsed off.

Like a wolf in the woods…

Glancing over her shoulder, she spotted him crouched on the grassy hill, rifle in hand. He was staring off into the distance, but she knew he was only focused on her.

Knew it as well as her own heartbeat.

Viscerally interdependent.

Innocent and primitive.

We run together.

That night they slept with the canvas off the Jeep, desperate for even the faintest breeze.

“Booker, why don’t you let me take first watch?” She offered.

He hid it well, but his exhaustion was starting to show beneath his eyes. She knew Booker didn’t sleep much—never had, since the day they met—but he was still human. And she was steadier with a weapon, had better instincts when night came now than she did.

“I’m alright, songbird,” he told her as he settled back against the door. “You sleep.”

Songbird. He’d never called her that before.

She wanted to tease him about it, but something desperate and hungry inside her was afraid he’d never say it again if she did.

She loved the pet name too much to lose it.

Her dream that night was of a house in the country. A buttercup yellow kitchen. Coffee brewing, the scent filling the whole room. A ring on her left finger, a big smile just for her, and kisses that didn’t end.

It was still dark when she stirred awake.

“Dreamin’?”

She stretched and looked up at him. “Mhm-hm.”

“Good one?”

Caitlin stilled. “Yeah. Yeah it was.”

“’Bout time,” Booker murmured.

She knew what he wasn’t saying.

Breaks my heart when you wake up frightened.

I hate that I can’t protect you from it.

Sleep still fogged her thoughts, made her loopy like she’d taken cold meds.

At least that was what she told herself, how she excused what she did next.

Pushing up onto her right hand, Caitlin reached for him. It was tentative, a graze of her fingers over his chest, up to the side of his neck.

Booker froze like a startled animal.

A wolf caught off guard.

He stared down at her, eyes locked on her in the dark. Sitting up as best as she could, Caitlin leaned close, nose brushing over his cheek before tilting up and pressing her lips to his.

Time became elastic, stretching in infinite directions.

Fixed in place, neither of them eased into the kiss for what felt like eternity. Both too shocked, too overwhelmed, too scared of it all being an elaborate hallucination.

And then his lips moved against hers gently, and time snapped back.

Caitlin lunged forward, clutching his face in her hands. She was starved, frantic… A wolf in her own right.

Booker wrapped his arm around her waist, dragging her closer. Blindly, he discarded his rifle to the side a safe distance away, right as she crawled into his lap. Knees on either side of his thighs, she kissed him like she was dying.

Maybe she had been. Maybe they both were.

Snaking his hands under the hem of her shirt, he lit sparks all over her skin. Her hips, her back, her ribs—everywhere he touched came alive.

Meanwhile she couldn’t get enough of his mouth.

That smart mouth that had pushed her to the edge so many times, driven her crazy, bickered with her for hours… Now she wanted nothing else but to taste every inch, to memorize each curve, to lose herself when his teeth sunk into her bottom lip.

A moan escaped her, and Booker’s grip tightened on her hips. She answered by grinding down against the growing bulge in his jeans and his breath stuttered.

Ducking down, she dragged her teeth over the tendon in his neck, and the full body shudder he had made her giddy.

His left hand came up under her chin, forcing her mouth back to his. This time he kissed her like he was branding her, and she turned to liquid beneath his touch.

They fumbled with each other’s shirts, yanking at fabric with little finesse. As soon as Booker cupped her breasts over the cotton of her bra, she arched forward like she’d been shocked.

Everything. She wanted everything, all at once.

She didn’t wait for him to attempt to unhook her—she reached back and undid her bra, sliding it off her arms and tossing it somewhere in the Jeep.

“How’s a man supposed to go slow when y’do somethin’ like that, huh?” He mumbled against the corner of her mouth.

Caitlin grinned and brought his hands up to her breasts again. Calloused palms were deliciously rough against sensitive flesh, skilled fingers pinching and tugging. Then his lips were gone from hers, only to find a new home latched on her left nipple, and she gasped sharply.

“Fuck,” she breathed, clutching the back of his head. He groaned against her, making her shiver, and she pulled his hair. He seemed to enjoy that if his tongue was any indicator.

Booker switched sides, making her head swim with how perfect it all was. He knew her, inside and out, could feel her signals even before she did.

Viscerally interconnected.

Without letting her go, Booker started undoing the fly of her jeans, popping the button one handed and tugging the zipper.

His fingers had just brushed the skin below her navel when a spike of something worrisome shot through her. She recoiled slightly, and he stopped everything.

“Too much?” He looked up at her. “We can stop, if—”

“No, no.” She clutched his hand. “I just… The last time I did this was before…”

Before the world ended.

“When I had a shower of my own, access to a razor…” She laughed softly.

Booker’s hand tangled in her hair as he dragged his nose between her breasts, over her collarbone, and up her neck.

“Smell like heaven to me,” he murmured, kissing her pulse point. “As for the razor…” His knuckles skimmed over her lower abdomen, stopping at the elastic of her underwear. “Never did care much for the shaved look.”

He nipped at her ear and she jerked, moaning quietly.

That settled it then.

In a flurry, she slid off him to yank her jeans down her thighs. Booker helped, chuckling at her enthusiasm. When they were off and tossed away, he bent down to kiss up her leg, from knee to hip, licking and teasing her as he went.

He moved along the length of her body, peppering her with kisses and kitten licks, driving her mad with lust.

Pushing at his thick shoulders, she forced him up, much to his confusion until he caught her meaning.

On your back.

He did so without hesitation, hauling her with him as he shifted.

She straddled him with fierce determination, planting her hands on his chest and leaning down to kiss him until he was groaning into her mouth.

Caitlin rocked her hips, egging him on with sweet torture. Booker’s fingertips dug into the meat of her ass and she whimpered as pleasure rolled through her.

“Cae…” His voice was gravel. “C’mere.”

She frowned, unsure of how much closer she could get. And then it clicked.

“Are you… I mean…”

Booker tugged at her hips, guiding her. “God, yes.”

It took a little maneuvering, careful not to knee him in the face, but then he was holding her still with those broad hands on either side of her hip bones.

He nuzzled the inside of her thighs, alternating between kissing and biting until she was choking on each gasp and moan. Sliding his thumb under the elastic, he yanked the center fabric to the side and—

“Oh, fuck,” she cried out, covering her mouth.

He slid his tongue between her folds, tasting thoroughly and groaning against her.

“Jack… Jack,” she panted, scrambling for purchase on the interior of the Jeep.

His moans were almost as desperate as hers. Sucking her clit between his lips, he hummed, and Caitlin saw stars.

“Jack!” She grabbed his hair, fingers twisting, and he nodded against her.

Do what you want.

Take what you need.

Fuck me.

Thrusting her hips, she worked against his tongue, finding a rhythm that left her almost breathless.

Barreling towards climax, she knew she couldn’t be quiet, knew she’d scream like a demon if given half the chance.

Grabbing his wrist, she yanked his hand to her mouth, taking his first three fingers down to the knuckle. Booker groaned, hips twitching involuntarily.

The first wave hit, and Caitlin arched back, cries muffled by his hand.

Her orgasm crashed over her, unrelenting. Booker took delight in eating her through it, burying his face between her thighs.

Releasing his fingers from between her lips, she gasped and tried to pull back.

“Booker, ah, oh God,” she moaned. “I… Can’t…”

Except he was still circling her clit with the tip of his tongue, and before she could try to climb down, she was shattering apart again.

“Jesus Christ, Jack,” she panted, pitching forward.

By the way he wasn’t slowing, he was gunning to give her a third, and she wasn’t sure if her body was aching from need or overstimulation.

He knew though. Knew she could take it, could have it, knew he’d die to feel her come on his tongue again.

Her palm smacked the driver’s seat headrest as she held on for dear life.

Wolf devouring wolf.

Consumed and made whole, all at once.

Caitlin’s voice cracked in half when she came again, nails gouging the upholstery.

Finally, Booker eased back, groaning like he’d been given a straight shot of dopamine.

He held her safely as she moved off him, catching her breath.

“Fuck me.”

Booker chuckled, running his fingers up his chin, collecting what was left dripping down him.

“No, Jack,” she said, waiting for him to look at her. “Fuck me.”

He stared, wide eyed for a split second, before he was rolling on top of her.

Caitlin clutched his face, kissing him deeply. He tasted like her, and it sent a thrill coursing through her.

Booker manhandled her onto her back, gripping her thighs as he slid her where he needed. Hitching her leg around his waist, he ground against her sensitive core, making her moan into his shoulder.

“I’ll try t’go easy,” he murmured into her neck.

She didn’t want easy. Didn’t want gentle.

She wanted to feel brutally alive with him inside her.

And she let him know just as much by digging her nails into his muscled back, scratching hard enough to leave welts.

“Ah, Cae,” he hissed, dropping his head to her sternum.

Placing a kiss there, he sat back just far enough to undo his belt and fly. The second he freed himself, Caitlin’s mouth watered.

Booker groaned, and she glanced up.

“Can’t look at me like that,” he said. “Killin’ me, darlin’.”

She grinned and trailed her hand over the ridgelines of his stomach to the course line of hair leading down from his navel.

“Have to show you what this mouth can do another time,” she said, fingers circling his length. He twitched in her hand and she bloomed with pride.

Leaning forward, Booker kissed her fiercely and grabbed her hips. In an instant he stripped her panties off, tossing them towards the front. Forcing her ass off the Jeep floor, he pulled her closer until she was resting on his thighs, legs spread wide around him.

She was already flushed and shaking with anticipation, and then he nudged at her entrance and she arched her back like a bow.

He took his time opening her up, sliding in inch by inch. When he bottomed out, she gasped and clutched his forearm, nails leaving red crescents deep in his skin.

“Yes, God yes,” she breathed, nodding.

Through half-shut eyes she watched him withdraw only to slam back inside her. His left hand kept her hips where he wanted, while his right reached up, squeezing her breast with just enough pressure to make her moan.

“Cae… Shit,” he grunted as he thrust.

He shook from all his restraint, but she needed more. Dragging her nails over his chest, she silently begged for him to let go.

He obliged.

Hips snapping forward, he picked up the pace until the Jeep was rocking from the force of it.

Alive. They were alive. With all the messy, complicated parts that entailed… They still had air in their lungs, still had heartbeats.

Still had each other.

Caitlin’s walls fluttered, clenching around him as she came with a broken cry.

Booker gripped her thighs hard enough to leave small bruises, and she wanted them all. He fucked her harder, growling as his climax hit, tipping him forward.

Gulping for air, face buried in her hair, Booker slowly came back to himself.

He kissed the hinge of her jaw, nosing her ear and cheek until she giggled.

“Well that’s the best car sex I’ve ever had,” she said, stroking his back.

Booker chuckled, sucking a mark into her neck. “Foldin’ seats are a miracle.”

She laughed again, and he groaned, feeling it from where he was still inside her. After a moment, he withdrew and haphazardly tucked himself back into his jeans, before laying down next to her.

Caitlin rolled to face him, and he offered himself as a pillow.

“Y’cold?” He asked, threading his fingers through her hair.

“You’re kidding right?” She kissed his chest. “Summer in Mississippi. I’ll never be cold again.”

He chuckled again, and she felt the reverberation in her own ribcage.

They laid in silence, listening to the crickets and each other’s breathing.

“Jack…”

He pressed his lips to the top of her head.

“Yeah.”

This meant something.

This really meant something.

Holding him tight, Caitlin drifted off to sleep with Booker’s heartbeat in her ear.

                                                               ***

She thought it was a dream. A vivid, intense dream concocted from the potent mix of loneliness, survival, and hormones.

And then she opened her eyes.

She was covered by one of Booker’s plaid shirts, naked underneath, and aching in every way that would indicate she had in fact fucked him in the back of the Jeep.

Booker wasn’t with her though.

Early morning light stung her sensitive eyes as she looked around. She spotted her jeans, shirt; her bra had landed on the dashboard.

Sitting up, she held the shirt to her chest and finger combed her hair. It was the first morning she’d ever woken up without Booker at her side, and it left her with a shaky feeling in her stomach.

“Jack?”

Nothing.

Caitlin pulled the shirt on, buttoning it, and slid out of the Jeep.

His rifle was gone, but everything else was where it should be. Even the few clothes they’d rinsed and left to dry on tree branches were there.

Taking stock of her surroundings, she made a list of things Booker would do, places he’d go, without waking her to tell her he was leaving.

It was a short list.

If he’d been relieving himself in the bushes, he’d have heard her and responded. So that left the pond.

Through the trees and over the slope of grassy hillside, she spotted the water glittering in the sun. The splashes gave him away.

Ducking beneath the surface, he popped back up, flinging his wet hair and scrubbing his face. He was waist deep, and from what she could tell, totally nude.

Being barefoot gave her a silent advantage, and she used it, sneaking closer to the bank and sitting down next to his clothes and rifle.

She didn’t get many opportunities to see him just… be. Not planning their route, watching for roaming Geeks, scavenging for supplies. Just being.

It felt vulnerable to her in a way she’d long thought couldn’t exist in a broken world.

She’d never been happier to be wrong.

Hugging her knees to her chest, she smiled as she waited for him to notice her.

She knew the second he did—Hand stilling as he washed his arm, head tilting just enough to spot her on the grass.

“You peepin’ on me now?” He asked, grinning.

“Maybe a little.”

Turning slowly in the water, his gaze raked over her bare legs. “How ‘bout you get in here and join me?”

“Somebody’s gotta keep watch.”

He always looked after her. Always put her safety ahead of his own. She would have done anything to return that favor, if only for a morning.

“Sayin’ I can’t multitask?”

She rolled her eyes, smile still playing at her lips. “We both know you struggle with that one.”

Wading over, his stare was predatory, but she’d never felt safer.

Gently grabbing her ankles, he pulled until her legs stretched out. She was considerably fairer skinned than he was, especially since her legs hadn’t seen daylight in two months. Wet fingers trailed over her, playing a subtle game of connect the dots with her freckles and the love bites and stubble burn he’d left on the inside of her thighs.

Rubbing his thumb over the darkest of the bruises, he glanced up at her face.

“Y’alright?”

Does it hurt?

Do you regret it?

Are we…

She cupped his jaw, brushing the corner of his mouth with her thumb, and smiled.

“Yeah.” In the sun she could see the red lines her nails had left on his shoulders and over his left pectoral. They’d marked each other.

She locked eyes with him. “You weren’t in the Jeep when I woke up.”

“You were out like a light,” he said, arching into her touch. “Didn’t have the heart to wake you.”

“You should’ve.” Her fingers toyed with the wet hair by his ear. “I was worried.”

His calloused palm skimmed up her thigh, disappearing beneath the hem of her borrowed shirt.

“’M sorry, songbird,” he murmured, kissing her wrist. “Y’gonna let me make it up to ya?”

She grinned and started undoing the few buttons she’d fastened.

Gripping her calves, he tugged her closer until her feet were in the water. “Knew it.”

“Knew what?”

“My shirt looks damn fine on you, darlin’.”

Her giggle was muffled by him leaning up to kiss her.

They had to go slow, as she was still sore, but she didn’t care. Especially when Booker was finally in her, drawing in and out languidly, making her moan each time he hit that perfect spot.

And then he pulled her leg up over his shoulder, and she was choking on a gasp.

“Beautiful, Cae,” he murmured, pressing his lips to the inside of her knee. “So beautiful.”

“Jack…” She clawed at the grass, at his bicep, desperate to hold onto something. “I’m…”

“That’s it.”

“Oh God.” She came with blinding intensity, arching her back and tossing her head against the bank of the pond.

He followed moments later, groaning her name.

Those few seconds of stillness were the closest to peace either of them had felt in months.

Dwelling in satisfaction, Caitlin stretched her legs, letting her feet submerge in the cool water. Letting her eyes close, she sighed, only to get yanked even closer to the edge of the pond by a grinning Booker. He caught her before she slid in the mud, hoisting her up and gently settling her into the water waist-deep.

Booker helped her get cleaned up, washing her hair for her and trailing kisses over the back of her neck. When he cupped her breast as she rinsed, she playfully splashed water in his face, making him laugh. They chased each other around the pond like it was their own Eden.

They’d already begun to feel like the only people on earth.

When they dried off and started back towards the Jeep, Booker handed her his plaid shirt back.

“Looks better on you,” he said, kissing her.

She waited until he wasn’t looking to bring it to her nose, breathing in his scent.

They planned as they ate.

Head to one of the highways they’d seen packed with abandoned cars, siphon as much gas as they could, scavenge food, clothes, and supplies, and start north. They’d mapped out several alternate routes in their days after leaving Alabama. If one was blocked, they had other ways to get around.

If they stuck to a strict schedule, rationed their food, and were able to find fuel along the way, they could be in New York by the end of the week.

Caitlin started to tremble. Hope… They had hope.

She might see her friends again.

#Bloody Sunrise #free fiction #free novels for pandemic times #NSF....W? #listen this is THE chapter if you catch my drift soooooo ya know go forth and enjoy #my work #ZA romance #zombie apocalypse romance

[shieldman-literature]

Undercover

Ian Booker stood on the corner of the street, hunched over his cigarette to protect it from the pouring rain. It wasn't a real cigarette, of course, since those hadn't been made in centuries, but it was a convincing hologram nonetheless. Ian had no interest in smoking, either. 

When he had first been stationed on this forsaken planet last year, he had been the sole human in a spaceport full of tentacles and eyestalks, and he made the decision right then and there to keep human traditions alive. So, there he was, a regular beat cop in a trenchcoat, glowering out into the night under a streetlamp with a cigarette hanging off of his lip. Cars passing by would probably think someone painted a cop novel cover and left it on the side of the street, he mused. He even had the graying hair, crow's feet, and leathery brown skin to sell the look. The seven foot tall, bubblegum pink cyclops next to him, however, threw off the vibe a bit. "We're on stakeout, Yametta. Do you think you could be a little less conspicuous?" Ian hissed as he pulled his wide-brimmed fedora down a little further. "Then no one would get to see my new Praustiche vest," Yametta replied, pointing to the gaudy logo that ran across the red fabric. "Nargul said it looked better without the gold trim, but I couldn't resist." Ian closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Y'know, it's a miracle you yahoos ever solved a single case before I got here," he sighed. Yametta pouted a bit but didn't respond. She and Nargul had been the sole representatives of the Alpha Guardians on the planet for quite some time, and while their success rate hadn't been great in the recent years, she didn't feel like it warranted sending such a stick-in-the-mud to constantly ruin their good time. A rumbling combustion engine cut Yametta's reverie short. "Big truck, artifact tech. Heading southeast on 23rd," Ian muttered into his collar. "Understood. It doesn't have a tracker, so I'll monitor with your badge cams and you guys pursue on foot," Nargul's voice crackled in Ian and Yametta's earpieces. While the two of them were more or less beat cops, Nargul was their dispatch, keeping them organized and relaying crucial information. The two cops exchanged looks. "I'll go through the back alleys to follow it. You circle around to 32nd and Kriln and intercept there," Ian said, starting off across the street. Yametta grabbed his shoulder. "Uh-uh. You'll get lost, or mugged, or both. I've lived here all my life. I'm taking the alleys," she said, pulling him back onto the curb. Ian gritted his teeth and sighed. "I know you're technically the senior detective here, but you're not exactly dressed for covert pursuit," he said. "Trust me, plenty of people dress like this in shady places around here. Besides," she said with a wink, a single ember sparkling next to her eye, "what're they gonna do if they catch me?" Ian sighed in resignation. Yametta took off towards the back of a nearby restaurant, giving him a half-salute as she ran. After taking one last drag on his holo-cigarette, he flicked it into the street, where it shimmered out of existence. Just because the cigarettes were fake didn't mean he was any better at running the long way around, he thought as he started down the side roads to the rendezvous point.

"Hey, looks like they had a change in plans," radioed Yametta from behind a dumpster. Out in the street, the truck had stopped by the curb and two burly-looking aliens had climbed out. They were tall, blue, and had two pairs of arms that jutted out from their shoulders like cliff faces. Their brutish look was capped off by their jagged mouths that looked more like demented knife racks than teeth. "Looks like two ayaki, both female, about 200 pounds, both hired to stand there and look tough. One on the left is cute--" "Yametta..." Nargul hissed. "--okay, the other one is like, a 7/10, but still--" "Yametta!" "Alright, alright! We're between 28th and 29th, right outside a tailor's, shop's name is 'The Slimporeum'," Yametta snapped. "Thank you. Gods below, woman, it's like you don't want me to know things. Ian, take your next right and follow that road to the new intercept point," Nargul growled, frantic typing clicking through her microphone. "I'll be there," Ian said through poorly suppressed gasps. "You better be," Yametta said, eyeing the truck as surreptitiously as she could. They were facing away from the alley entrance, so she could get across the street and in front of the truck, then come around curbside and fry the first one before the second one... "Oi, Yametta, you sure are bold showing your face 'round here!" Yametta's head whipped around to face the voice from deeper in the alley. There, at the far wall and sporting a spiked leather jacket, stood a scrawny blue alien - another ayaki. She knew this one, though. "Ah, Tinga. Long time no see," Yametta said, her eye flicking nervously between him and over her shoulder. "Yeah, real long time. Almost long enough to forget that you owe me a grand," Tinga said, his smile devoid of warmth. The two sized each other up, Yametta's fists clenched and Tinga's hand on his pocket. "Can we do this later? I'm in the middle of a case." "Not my problem, toots. What is my problem is if I come back to the boss and say I didn't collect from someone who's overdue, big time." Tinga's hand slipped into his pocket and closed around something. "Us working stiffs with ACTUAL jobs take a little longer to pull together a spare grand, y'know. Tell your boss he'll get his money." "Not good enough," Tinga snarled. Before the gun had even left his pocket, a gout of flame leaped from Yametta's outstretched fist, slamming him into the wall. Two more fiery punches sailed through the air and pounded him through the wall and into the storage room on the other side. Yametta winced with each echoing blast. There was no way the ayaki guarding the truck hadn't heard them. Sure enough, two doors slammed as she sprinted to the mouth of the alley. The squeal of rubber on pavement rang out as the truck tore away from the curb. "For fuck's sake, Tinga, you're a nuisance even when you're unconscious," Yametta cursed as she rubbed her temple. "Nice job staying subtle," Ian said, making Yametta jump with his sudden appearance. "When the hell did you get here?" she demanded, towering over him with a massive scowl on her face. "Just a second ago. I was going to radio you but you seemed... preoccupied. Old friend?" "What do you think?" "I dunno. The guys and I back home would give each other a hard time constantly. Figured you cyclopes just had a higher bar for that stuff," Ian said, cracking a smile for the first time that night. Yametta didn't reciprocate the gesture. "Very funny. Thanks to him, we're back to square one." "Hm. I wouldn't say square one," Ian said, strolling across the street to stoop by the curb where the truck had been parked. "Looks like you spooked 'em bad enough that they got sloppy." He held up a tiny plastic rectangle for his partner to take. "A credit chit?" Yametta asked, incredulous. "Thank Shamaa, you two goons managed to find an actual clue!" Nargul hid none of the disdain in her voice. "Hold it up to your badge, I'll scan it in and run the previous transactions to see if we can nail any fronts they might be visiting." "Good idea. Speaking of, why do you think they were parked here?" Yametta mused, looking around at the boarded up windows of 'The Slimporeum' while she put the credit chit in her vest pocket. The tiny patch of green in front of the building was wild and unkempt, with trash built up in the entrance alcove. Safe to say, she thought, the place was abandoned. "Beats me. Maybe it's a safehouse? No one's going in there without a damn good reason," Ian said, tapping a button on the inside of his coat to summon up a holographic cigarette. The two of them stared at the door for several long seconds. A loud bang startled both of them to attention. A young ayaki was running down the road towards them, his mother yelling for him from behind a slammed screen door. "Hey! Hey! You guys can't go in there! That place is haunted as all getout!" The child reached Ian and tugged on his sleeve, urging him to get away. "Haunted, eh?" A thoughtful look crossed Ian's face, and he turned to glance at Yametta. "Sounds like we might have some ghost busting to do." "Ghost... busting? What does that even mean?" she replied, raising her eyebrow. "Y'know, bustin' makes me feel good? The poet Aykroyd? No? Ah, forget it. Old human thing." He rolled his eyes. "Let's head back to HQ. We're gonna need some spiritual reinforcement." "Way ahead of you," Nargul cackled through the radio. She hopped down off of her computer chair on her squat, froglike legs and ambled over to a pile of crystalline skeletons. Admiring her mottled green skin in the reflection, she smiled. "Rise and shine, lovelies!" she called, kicking the pile. The pile groaned in response. "Come now, you've rested for almost a week. Up and at 'em." "One hundred and fifteen years of servitude, you'd think we would earn a break now and then," came a hollow voice from the jumble of bones. Another, higher, voice responded. "Oh, stuff it, Ron, working for the Interplanetary Defense Force beats where those other poor souls ended up." "Yeah, yeah, keep your femurs on, Harriet," Ron said, assembling himself from the bone pile, twisting a crystalline skull into place. Next to him, another skeleton stood, dislodging bones from its ribcage. "Alright, Ron and Harriet, your job is to run spiritual interception for Ian and Yametta at a class B residential haunting. The specter is currently unobserved, so I'm sending two of you just in case. Any questions?" Nargul looked up at the two skeletons, arms crossed expectantly. "How much paid leave do I have left?" Ron said, raising his hand. Harriet whacked the back of his skull, sending it spinning. "She meant about the mission, bonehead," Harriet said. Ron grabbed his head and spun it the right way around again. "No questions, master." Ron put enough venom on the last word to kill an elephant. Nargul laughed. "Then off you go. Ian and Yametta will meet you on the scene. Remember, you don't get paid if the specter escapes!" With her final command, Nargul trundled over to a box of chalk beside the pile of crystal bones. From it, she withdrew a piece of dusty red chalk, a sprig of heather, and a handful of dried ground mint leaves. She cast the mint powder across the earth before the two skeletons, murmuring an incantation as she indicated towards the dust with the heather. Moving quickly, she drew a circle with the chalk around the mint powder, a cool azure glow starting to fade in around her. The spell was complete. Nargul clapped her hands, and like clockwork, the two skeletons stepped in unison into the circle and stepped out onto a city street. Reflexively, Ron reached out to grab Harriet's arm. "I don't have a stomach anymore, but I'll be damned if it doesn't get turned by that spell every time," he said. Harriet straightened him up. "Look alive, Ron. We have company," she said, gesturing to Ian and Yametta. "Oh, stars above, she sent Ron again? Why can't we get Thomas or Nancy? They have a sense of humor," Yametta said, sticking out her tongue at the skeletons. "I come back from the grave to help you out, and that's the welcome I get?" Ron retorted, moving his head as if he were rolling his eyes. The two of them burst out laughing and embraced, Yametta lifting the much smaller skeleton in her arms before setting him down again. "How the hell are you, old man?" "You'd think the aches and pains would go away after the body does, but hey, I'm still here! What kind of mess have you kids gotten yourselves into today?" "Two suspects, both female ayaki, were seen conducting suspicious business in front of this building," Ian explained, gesturing up towards the sign for the "Slimporeum". "We seem to be dealing with a class B nonmalignant specter, unknown duration of haunting. The locals seem pretty spooked by it. That's where you come in. You go in, sweep the immediate area, and we'll file in behind you to do some investigation. Sound good?" Ron and Harriet nodded. Yametta turned to address the three of them. "If things get... weird in there, I'll provide covering fire while we retreat. It's a recon mission, not whatever Ian said--" "We aren't busting ghosts," he interrupted, smiling as he looked at Harriet knowingly. She flashed two finger guns from her hips. "Too bad. I was hoping for some supernatural showdowns today," she said. It was Yametta's turn to sigh. "Whatever, you nerds. Ron and Harriet, to the front. Ian, silver bullets loaded? Good. Places, everyone." The odd group lined up beside the entrance. Ron raised a hand to the rest, a silent countdown on his fingers. On zero, he pulled the door open and jumped inside, followed quickly by Harriet. The antechamber that greeted them was lit only by the slice of light from the cracked door behind them. From their position beside the door, Ron and Harriet could just make out a receptionist's counter, long abandoned and covered in unattended paperwork. The walls were lined with paintings of vague tropical landscapes. Chairs in varying stages of disuse dotted the floor. At the far end of the room, a doorless archway trailed off into darkness. "Room is clear, but definitely haunted," Ron said, leaning back out of the door, "and I don't mean because it has two skeletons in it." Ian and Yametta entered the building behind them, gun and flame raised, sweeping the room again to confirm the skeletons' assessment. "Spectral analysis is off the charts," Nargul said to the team through their earpieces. "Don't need to tell me twice. Hair on the back of my neck is stiff as a board. Keep us posted for any spikes in apparition magic," Ian said, gripping his pistol tighter. The squad made their way across the empty room. As if on cue, the door to the outside creaked closed. Harriet jumped and grabbed Ron's arm. Yametta tapped her earpiece with a frown. "Anyone else getting interference on their headsets?" she said. Ian did the same, with similar results. "Specter must have cut off our wireless signal. Proceed with caution; it knows we're here," Ian said, his ghost-related mirth replaced with his usual stony demeanor. Yametta swallowed to steady her nerves. After a quick sweep of the room from the middle, they proceeded towards the hallway. Harriet stopped them at the threshold. "That isn't regular no-lights darkness in there, honey. It's magical darkness. I can't see a thing," she said. Ian and Yametta exchanged nervous glances. "We've come to avenge you," called Ian into the dark. Several seconds passed with no response. "We're here to... lay your remains to rest?" He pulled a grubby notepad out of his trenchcoat pocket and paged through it. "We're here to reconnect you with your loved ones. We've come to repossess this land. We want to desecrate this holy place." Every line he tried was followed by a few seconds of silence. Finally, he flipped ahead a few pages and took a deep breath. "We're here to make a bargain," Ian said, and the texture of the words felt different, as if they were pressed into the velvet of the darkness before them. The air around them grew cold. Ron stepped forward and raised a hand. "That lifted a barrier," he said, tracing the outline of some invisible structure in the air. "Then it's at least a third-circle demon," Ian said, his voice soaked in dread. Like an ancient wooden response, a door at the far end of the hallway opened, spilling the light of sickly green fire into view. A low, rumbling voice called out from the doorway. "Astute observation, Mr. Booker. Do come in." "Local omniscience. Make that a fourth-circle demon. We're in for a long day, team," Ian said, holstering his gun. Yametta lowered her hands and extinguished her fire. "I give it five sentences before it tries to bargain for your soul," Yametta said. "I got a lady back home that I have to answer to, and I'm more afraid of her than I am of this thing," Ian replied, flipping up the collar on his trenchcoat and starting his way down the long hallway towards the demon's door. Pale green flames bobbed through the air around the demon, seated comfortably at a mahogany desk that was untouched compared to the rest of the building. The flames cast a pall over the room that made the portraits that covered the walls look washed out and tired. Despite their light, the room felt dark. Not the kind of dark where there isn't enough light to see, but the kind of dark that works to muscle in where light should be. Ian kept his eyes fixed on the demon. Its body was comprised of a large charcoal-colored cylinder, with eyes running in winding seams up and down its sides and two leathery wings folded at odd angles to its sides. It was a bizarre and upsetting sight to behold. Ian conjured up another holographic cigarette. "Mr. Booker, I have--" "Guardian Booker, actually. IPDF, special supernatural division," Ian said, digging out his badge and flipping it open towards the demon. The seams of eyes all over its body blinked in unison. Ron and Harriet jumped through the door behind him, waving their arms erratically, and the green flames winked out of existence. Yametta ducked through the doorway last, cracking her neck as she straightened to her full seven and a half foot height. "You're under arrest for unlawful haunting of a private property, bargain-striking with intent to soulmonger, and two counts of inciting terror in the local populace. Anything you say or conjure can and will be used against you in a court of law," Ian rambled off his script, flicking on the flashlight on his badge. The demon's eyes flared bright green and it began to rise into the air. "FOOLISH MORTAL! EYCRAYUS THE UNSHACKLED WILL NOT--" There was a dull thunk as its hard body fell back into its seat. Harriet lowered her arms, two fists full of glimmering purple sparks casting a lavender glow over the demon. "What witchcraft is this? I am EYCRAYUS! IT THAT SWALLOWED A MILLION CITIES! I HAVE MY RIGHTS!" the demon bellowed, its wings beating ineffectually behind it. Ian walked towards the desk, a pair of handcuffs dangling from one hand. "You sure do, buddy. Let me read them off to you while we get you ready for transport," Ian said. The demon's body burst open, a maw of endless teeth gaping over Ian's head, forcing him to backpedal. Spindly legs of darkness coalesced around it and grabbed whatever they could. The demon launched itself at Ian mouth-first. Yametta crashed into its side, sending the two of them rolling in a flurry of fists and gnashing teeth. An unholy screech split the air. Ron ran to Yametta's aid, deadening the lights in the demon's eyes when they flashed with rage. Harriet stood by Ian, checking him over. "Are you alright, love?" she asked him, concern in her voice. "Yeah, didn't get me too bad," Ian said, looking at the tear in his jacket. A bloodstain was growing below the tear, and he winced as he touched it. "Nothing a bandage won't take care of." A loud crack made the two of them look up towards the battle behind the desk. Yametta had her arms around one of the demon's terrible jaws, and a thick ochre fluid oozed from fractures in its hide. Ron held its lower jaw back with rune-covered bindings he had conjured from the floor. Between the two of them, the demon was scrabbling at the floor for purchase with its shadow limbs, screeching in rage, its wings flapping enough to rattle the paintings on the wall. "Harriet, help them subdue that thing. I'll look for something to deal with it in its desk," Ian said, pulling up his torn sleeve and standing. Harriet nodded and began channeling another set of bindings to secure the demon. Ian dashed to the mahogany desk, rifling through the drawers, scanning for anything that could give them an edge. Bone idol? No. Scroll of human skin? No, wrong hell prince's seal. There. In the bottom drawer. An obsidian dagger, inlaid with silver, carved to resemble a snake's tongue. Ian snatched it from its nest of paperwork and lobbed it at Yametta. "Catch!" he yelled, and Yametta snatched the dagger out of the air. "In the name of Shamaa, Mistress of the Night and Shepherd of Lost Souls, we consign you to the endless void from whence you were forged!" Ian chanted the invocation as quickly as he could, and as he finished the last word, Yametta plunged the dagger into a crack in the demon's carapace. Ochre fluid spattered across her arm and onto the floor. The room seemed to bend inwards for a moment. Then the demon exploded. White light surged out of its mouth, its eyes, every crack and hole in its skin, flinging Yametta and Ron to opposite sides of the room. Its broken body contorted and folded in on itself, each movement accompanied by a sickening snap. The demon folded itself out of existence, its hissing cut off by reality reasserting itself. A minute passed before anyone spoke. "Fourth-circles usually talk a lot more before going chompy. Something had this one riled up," Yametta said. She hoisted herself up against a file cabinet and glanced over her wounds. Her natural cyclopean healing had already taken over, the puncture wounds from the demon's teeth sealing over as she watched. Ron stretched and hobbled over to Harriet. "Next time, spend a little less time fawning over the mortals and a little more time wrapping up the demon, eh?" he said. "You're certainly not going to check on them, so someone has to!" she retorted, crossing her arms. The two of them bickered back and forth as Ian sat down in the chair by the desk. "There's gotta be a reason those ayaki were coming to see this demon..." Ian mused, flipping through the papers in the drawers. A dog-eared piece of parchment caught his eye. The ink had a familiar reddish tinge, and at the bottom was a signature with no shortage of flourishes. He picked it up and glanced at the wording. It was some sort of legal document. "Looks like our perp here had a deal with a high-ranking lady in the crime world," Ian said, spinning slowly in the chair as he read. "The name on the contract is definitely an alias, but what she was bargaining for was... in all honesty, pretty benign. It says here that in exchange for the souls of twenty-five ayaki and one postmortal, one Ms. Blundersnout is to receive ownership of the Tarot chain of hotels? If she's a crime lord of any repute, she could just pull a hostile takeover, couldn't she?" "It sounds like our jobs are done here," interjected Ron, dusting himself off and wandering towards the door. "You kids have fun playing cops and robbers. I'll be off collecting my well-earned Z's after another job well done." "It's been lovely, dears," Harriet said, following him towards the door. "Likewise, missus," Yametta said with a smile. "And Ron, make sure you have Nargul go over your bones real close after the mission. Gotta make sure you didn't strain your hand with all the patting yourself on the back you're doing." "Hey, someone has to do the heavy lifting around here, might as well be me," Ron said, giving a knowing nod that would have been a wink if he still had eyelids. The two skeletons filed out of the room, leaving Yametta and Ian to peruse the demon's belongings. "So, what do you think? Insurance fraud?" Yametta asked, scratching her head as she stared at the contract Ian had unearthed. "Insurance fraud is what desperate people do when they're short on cash. None of the postmortal crime lords even know what 'poor' means. If you ask me, there's gotta be something on that land that our Ms. Blundersnout wants without anyone being the wiser about it," Ian said as he leaned back in the chair. There were a lot of unknown variables in the equation, he thought, and he had always hated math. "Sounds like it's time to do a little more legwork. What do you wanna bet that there's a big artifact truck parked out back behind the Tarot hotel?" Yametta said. "I'm not a betting man, but I have a feeling you'd win that wager," Ian said. He put his feet up on the desk and swapped his holographic cigarette to a cigar. "You know, I could get used--" He was cut short by the thunk of crystal against wood. A glimmering purple skull rolled into the room from the hallway. "We got company," Ron said, his skull hopping up and down with each word. Gunfire tore into the room. Yametta caught three bullets across her chest, while Ian ducked below the desk before a spray of lead tore open the chair where he had been sitting. "Aww, c'mon! I was gonna take that chair!" Ian yelled from under the desk. Yametta staggered to the desk and upended it, sending paperwork scattering across the floor in front of her makeshift barrier. She dropped to the floor next to Ian. "We'll requisition a new one when we get back to base," Yametta said through gritted teeth. She lit up her hands with arcane fire. Ian produced his pistol and crawled to the other end of the desk. "Awright, we know youse in there! Come out an' play!" said a gruff voice from the hallway. Yametta looked over to Ian, and they nodded. "Okay, but a word of warning: we play rough!" Yametta shouted as she vaulted over the desk. Two bolts of fire leaped from her hands and sailed into the darkness. Ian popped up and unloaded six shots after them, a tight cluster at chest height. As though she was the third volley, Yametta crashed out into the hallway, fists flying. In the supernatural darkness, her hands found purchase on some sort of fabric, and she yanked two figures into the light. Each was an ayaki dressed in sharp-looking suits, somewhat marred by scorch marks and bullet holes. Ian broke out of the cover and ran towards the crowd in the doorway. With a roar, Yametta slammed their heads together, stunning them for long enough that Ian could push past them into the hallway. "Youse gonna pay for that!" one of the ayaki slurred, shoving Yametta back into one of the file cabinets. The other ayaki charged her and crashed his fist into her jaw. Yametta grunted in pain and ducked under his next unsteady blow. Her motion carried her down to the ayaki who had her pinned to the file cabinet, and she put both hands on his sides. Fire erupted from underneath him, and with a yelp, he jumped off of her and flung himself to the ground. "A little help, guys!" Yametta called into the hallway. Ian stopped in the foyer and turned to see the battle unfolding poorly behind him. Around him, the scattered remains of Ron and Harriet lay motionless. "Harriet! Still with us?" Ian said, kneeling. "Oh my stars... yes, dearie, but I'm a little out of sorts," said a skull from beside him. "That's alright. Can you still cast spells?" "I suppose so, but what--" "Great. Get ready," Ian said as he scooped Harriet's skull up and sprinted back to the room. The two ayaki had Yametta cornered behind the desk. She looked past them at the doorway, and her eye went wide. "Heads up!" Ian yelled as he brandished Harriet's skull at the two thugs. Her eye sockets lit with brilliant azure light and a blazing beam of blue flame burst forth from her mouth, barreling into the room. Yametta ducked behind the desk just in time for the fire to sail over her head. The two ayaki cried out in surprise and dove aside, their suits alight with spectral flame. "Not bad for a disembodied head," Harriet said, giggling to herself. "I'll say. Yametta, move! Grab Ron's head and hightail it outta here!" Ian called, waving her over as he turned to run again. In the foyer, Ian hastily gathered as many bones as he could, a demented bundle growing in his arms. With a shout, Yametta charged into the room, Ron's skull in hand, and hoisted Ian under her free arm. "Nargul can grow more! Those goons are gonna be in here any second!" Yametta said, kicking the door off its hinges on her way out. Startled ayaki looked on from their homes as she, Ian, and the two skulls roared into the street. "Nargul! We need a transport STAT!" Yametta yelled, her earpiece crackling to life. "Yametta? Where in the nine--" Nargul began, but Ian cut her short. "We have two armed suspects in hot pursuit, we need transport!" he shouted into his earpiece. "Sending two lightwaves to your location," Nargul said. "Get back here!" Yametta looked over her shoulder to see the two ayaki, burned and bruised, stumbling out of the doorway. She hefted Ian in her hand and tossed him to his feet. Despite her regenerative abilities, Yametta was wounded, and Ian wasn't quick to begin with. The ayaki were gaining on them. "Lightwaves, coming in hot!" Ian said, jabbing a finger at the two points of light tearing towards them down the street. Yametta hurled a fireball over her shoulder to slow the oncoming thugs. With a roar, two sleek, white motorcycles drew up alongside them. Ian clambered aboard the first one, stowing Harriet's skull in a compartment under the seat. Yametta hauled herself onto the second motorcycle, its motors whining to accommodate the seven-foot cyclops. One of the ayaki leaped at her, sinking his nails into the metal of the motorcycle's chassis. Yametta kicked at his arms as she tried to accelerate, but the combined weight of two musclebound aliens was too much for the lightweight bike. The ayaki dragged himself up towards Yametta. He grasped at her vest, its fabric tearing at the seams. Yametta pulled back on the vest, but it gave way, ripping off of her shoulders and sending the ayaki tumbling to the street. "That was a Praustiche vest, you bastard!" Yametta shouted at the rapidly disappearing form of the ayaki. "And on a cop's salary, too..." "We'll claim it on the damages report. Just be glad you made it out alive," Ian said through his earpiece. "When we find those goons' boss, I'm gonna pound the two thousand credits she owes me outta her with a hammer." "Revenge always makes for the best cop movies," Ian said. Yametta laughed, and the two of them sped off down the street towards the IPDF station.

#writing #fantasy #scifi #fiction #IPDF

[jenmedsbookreviews]

So. Funny old week. Started off in a rather unspectacular fashion. Went to work. Did work type stuff. Got bored. Rinse and repeat on Tuesday. Well, Health and Safety meeting on Tuesday so I was mainly depressed by lunchtime, but still relatively uneventful. Flying visit to Dublin on Wednesday (literal as it’s a long walk from my house) in which I managed to set the Irish budget (mostly). Go me. On the plus side I got a lot of reading in at the airports and on the plane so it wasn’t all bad.

Thursday… what to say about Thursday? Well, first up, I was only in work for half a day which is always nice. I had the afternoon booked off to attend the book launch of Lloyd Otis’s debut novel, Dead Lands. Great book which I’ll be reviewing very soon and which, coincidentally, I was actually reading on my way to London. Arriving in London, me and my sister decided to treat ourselves to some wonderful Danish pastries at Ole & Steen on Haymarket. If you like Danish pastry (and I mean the real deal not the soggy stuff you find festering in the cake department fo supermarkets) then you could do worse than visit this place. I’m not being paid to say this, not at all. I just happen to think their food is lush and very reasonably priced for a central London Cafe/Restaurant.

So, one lovely toastie and cake fest later, Mandie and are are headed to the nearby (overpriced) giant sweet shop so that she can buy her friend a stick of pink rock. It’s a thing… Don’t ask. While I’m loitering in the entrance trying not to get enraged by the prices they are charging (£10 for a box of Oreo cookies!!!) I decide to check my emails. Oh my giddy Aunts. I won’t lie. I know I must have looked like a complete div. I know this as while I was reading one particular email I was stood staring out at Piccadilly Circus literally opened mouthed in shock, waiting for Mandie to join me and check that I wasn’t actually seeing things. Please note – I am getting very old and I wasn’t wearing my glasses so I could quite honestly have been reading anything. But no. I wasn’t seeing things. What I was reading was real.

I had received an e-mail from The Writer Awards, telling me that I had been named as one of the top nominated book blogs. Apparently they had been seeking nominations and from 1000+ recommendations, my little old blog had been selected as one of the best. Now, being honest, and being blind, I hadn’t read the whole email and I am always cautious about selecting links in emails as you never know if it’s a virus. I’d seen mention of top 33 so I figured number 30 wouldn’t be bad, but being the sceptical soul that I am, I googled The Writer Awards rather than followed the link. Sure enough a site showed up a the top of Google and I clicked through to find the Blogger Awards near the top of teh site. As I started clicking through the list, I really expected to be scrolling through for hours. Imagine my surprise when at No.10 I found Jen Med’s Book Reviews. No. 10!!!

I double checked the e-mail and sure enough there it was. Ranked no. 10. Of 1000+ blogs. And why – well apparently this little weekly mind melt is one of the reasons. Who knew. I thought it was just a good way to fill a gap in my blogging diary 😀

For those of you reading this on a phone, what this says is

This blog nicely weaves in the author’s own adventures through weekly recaps. It’s like you’re following a bookish journey from book tours to recaps to the reviews themselves. The creator’s personality really shines through!

Now personally I believe that they missed the word disorder out of the above statement but let’s look at the facts: Weekly adventures from book tours (Dead Lands – check), recaps (look below – check) and the reviews themselves (see the bottom of the post for links to all of last weeks posts – check). Well. Yep. That’s me then.

All joking aside, I am still rather stunned to have received the email. I’ve only been blogging for around 15/16 months, and in all honesty, only really been pushing myself to take it seriously since last November (a post a day for months now excluding Christmas) so this is absolutely amazing. Whoever it was that nominated me, thank you. It really means a lot. I knew nothing about this, can’t really understand how I got here, but at least I know that all of my hard work (well reading and occasional rambling) does mean something. I often feel that although I have a bias towards crime fiction, my blog is neither one thing or another, and so it feels like it’s harder to build a following that it might be for a dedicated crime fiction or Sci-fi/fantasy focused blog for example. And anyone who knows me will testify that being recognised for my ‘personality’ has seldom been a good thing in the past. 😉 So, for a gal without a gimmick I’m feeling kind of proud.

Enough of the fluffiness… Back to Thursday night. What an evening. So great to see Lloyd again and to be able to help him celebrate his success. I have no doubt that Dead Lands is going to do really well and that he has an amazing future in front of him. I first met Lloyd at Crimefest which seems forever ago now – long I’m sure for Lloyd – but it is so good to be able to support him on his journey, even if it’s just by way of a review. Good luck, Lloyd.

So. Back to my week. Friday was all work. Boo hiss… Any way. Moving on.

Book post wise – well Monday saw my last Mr Men Christmas book arrive so I am all set for Christmas month on the blog. Sort of. And, you know how Thursday was a pretty awesome kind of a day? Well what I didn’t mention is that when I popped home at lunch before catching my train I was greeted by the Post Man bringing me a parcel. A bookish parcel. A very exciting bookish parcel. It was only Now We Are Dead by Stuart MacBride which I’ll be reviewing for First Monday Crime in November. Stuart will be appearing alongside authors Vaseem Khan, Simon Booker and Elodie Harper, with the panel charied by Barry Forshaw. I was lucky enough to attend October’s panel and I’m sure as heck going back for the next one. Maybe I’ll see you there.

Book purchase wise – well aside from the signed copy of Dead Lands (whoop whoop), I’ve been a very good girl. I only bought 4 books. Just 4. 2 preorders, Helen Phifer’s Dying Breath and Susi Holliday’s The Deaths of December, and two books recommended in Ann Girdharry’s recent Book Love post as they sounded right up my street, LaRose by Louise Errdich and Red Blood, Yellow Skin by Linda L.T. Baer.

Netgalley saw me downloading two titles again, both for blog tours. First up Stephen Edger’s Dying Day and also Kierney Scott’s Now You See Me. I also received an ARC of Jennifer Gilmour’s new book (more on that tomorrow).

  And aside from some teeny tiny audible purchases, namely Elly Griffiths’ The Chalk Pit, Val McDermid’s Insidious Intent and B.A. Paris’s Behind Closed DoorsBehind Closed Doors that is absolutely it.

B.Reading wise, I read just the four books this week. Been busy and in schock 😉

Books I have read

Zenka by Alison Brodie

Devious, ruthless, and loyal.

Zenka is a capricious Hungarian with a dark past.

When cranky London mob boss, Jack Murray, saves her life she vows to become his guardian angel – whether he likes it or not. Happily, she now has easy access to pistols, knives and shotguns.

Jack discovers he has a son, Nicholas, a male nurse with a heart of gold. Problem is, Nicholas is a wimp.

Zenka takes charges. Using her feminine wiles and gangland contacts, she will make Nicholas into the sort of son any self-respecting crime boss would be proud of. And she succeeds!

Nicholas transforms from pussycat to mad dog, falls in love with Zenka, and finds out where the bodies are buried – because he buries them. He’s learning fast that sometimes you have to kill, or be killed.

As his life becomes more terrifying, questions have to be asked:

How do you tell a mob boss you don’t want to be his son?

And is Zenka really who she says she is?

I read Alison’s last book, Brake Failure last year and really enjoyed the blend of humour and action. Based around an East End crime boss who is trying to get to know his son for the first time, this book is packed full of laughs, action and the odd body dump. It had me chuckling all the way through at the series of mishaps and misunderstandings. And god help Olga!!! You can see my review next week and in the meantime you can order the book here.

…

Dead Lands by Lloyd Otis

The stunning debut from thriller writer Lloyd Otis. 

When a woman’s body is found a special team is called in to investigate and prime suspect Alex Troy is arrested for the murder. Desperate to remain a free man, Troy protests his innocence, but refuses to use his alibi. Trying to protect the woman he loves becomes a dangerous game – questions are asked and suspicions deepen. 

When the prime suspect completes a daring escape from custody, DI Breck and DS Kearns begin the hunt. Breck wants out of the force while Kearns has her own agenda and seeks revenge – and a right-wing march provides an explosive backdrop to their hunt for Troy. 

Lloyd Otis brings a startling account of the past back to life over a burgeoning ’70s landscape, and delivers a thrilling piece of crime fiction that will excite any fan of the genre.

What a debut. Full of suspicion, tension there is a ruthless and brutal killer on the loose but is he the man the police suspect? Set in 1970’s London I loved the freedom that this brings to the narrative as well as adding to the tension as you know that the police cannot rely on the forensics to get their man. So will justice prevail? Well – read for yourself to find out. I have and I’ll be reviewing in a little over a week for the blog tour. However, the book is available now and you can bag a copy here.

…

A Cosy Candlelit Christmas by Tilly Tennant

All singleton Isla wants for Christmas is to be left in peace, but a surprise trip to the Alps means there’s a chance for romance in every snowflake that falls…

It’s the week before Christmas and Isla McCoy has just received an unexpected gift: a letter announcing she is due a life-changing inheritance, but only if she’s willing to make amends with the father who abandoned her. 

She has absolutely no intention of forgiving him, but who could resist an all-expenses-paid trip to the French resort of St Martin-de-Belleville? 

There she meets smooth-talking Justin and nerdy glaciologist Sebastian; two very different men, with two very different agendas. Torn between her head and her heart, Isla finds herself utterly lost in a winter wonderland of her own feelings. 

Surrounded by twinkling candles and roaring log-fires, Isla’s resolve finally begins to melt. But will she learn how to reconnect, not only with a whole new family, but with herself and her heart?

A gorgeously heart-warming festive read to help spark a little romance in those long winter nights. Perfect for fans of Jane Linfoot, Debbie Johnson and Jenny Colgan.

The difficult situation of meeting her estranged father is what greets Isla this Christmas. But maybe that’s not all. In an idyllic ski-resort setting, with crisp white snow and beautiful scenery all around, could love also be on the cards. Released on 26th October, I’ll be spilling the beans on this book really soon, in the meantime you can order a copy right here.

…

The Lost Child by Patricia Gibney

They placed me in here and threw away the key. I look down at the gown they’ve put on me. I want my own clothes. I don’t know how long I’ve been here.

An elderly woman is found murdered in her own home, and Detective Lottie Parker and her partner Detective Boyd are called in to investigate. When they discover that the victim’s daughter is missing as well, they start to fear for the safety of the whole family…

Two days later as a nearby house is set on fire and with the body count rising, Lottie and her team begin to unpick a web of secrets and lies, as the murders seem to link back to a case investigated by Lottie’s father before he took his own life. 

With little knowledge of what really happened to her father, Lottie knows this is a case that could give her some answers. But how much does she want to know? And how far is Lottie prepared to dig to uncover the truth?

The Lost Child is a thrilling page-turner from the bestselling author of The Missing Ones and The Stolen Girls that will have you guessing right to the very last page. Perfect for fans of Rachel Abbott, Angela Marsons and Robert Dugoni.

Book three in the Lottie Parker series sees our troubled Irish Detective investigating a murder and brutal attack which could well have links back to her own father. With her personal life as complicated as ever, can Lottie keep her head clear enough to get to the truth? You can find out when the book is released on 27th October if you preorder the book right here.

…

I’ll take that as I’ve been busy this week. Blogging wise, another really full on week of reviews and book love which you can follow right here.

The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra

#BookLove: Anne Williams

Snowflakes, Iced Cakes and Second Chances

#BookLove: Ann Girdharry

Cover Reveal: Conrad Jones

Press Release: Heywood Hill Competition

Her Last Secret by Barbara Copperthwaite

The Fallen Agent by Oliver Tidy

Snare by Lilja Sigurdardottir

The week ahead is just as busy with a mammoth number of blog tours. First up today is Zoe Sharp’s Fox Hunter; on Wednesday is The Second Son by Andy Blackman, Thursday is Lily Graham’s Christmas At Hope Cottage and Friday is Sharon Maas’ The Girl From The Sugar Plantation. I’ll also have book love posts from Joanne Robertson of My Chestnut Reading Tree and Meggy Roussel of Chocolate’n’Waffles and my second Inspector Chopra review. Busy, busy, busy – just how I like it.

Adventure wise – well nothing bookish but I’ve got to travel to Manchester and Edinburgh this week to deliver some project training so who know what I’ll listen to along the way.

Have a fabulous week of bookishness all.

JL  (award winning book bloggist  )

Rewind, recap: Weekly update w/e 15/10/17 So. Funny old week. Started off in a rather unspectacular fashion. Went to work. Did work type stuff.

#Rewind Recap #Weekly Round UP